We the Animals

I saw a favorable review for We the Animals by Justin Torres in Bookpage a while back and put the title in my ever growing I'll-Have-To-Check-That-Out-Someday list. It sounded interesting but not enough that I was ready to run right out and try to find it. Then I was browsing the new books at the library and saw it. It's a tiny little book (only 125 pages) so I grabbed it. Alan read it first (and enjoyed it) and when he was done, I picked it up.

The novel is a coming-of-age type story about three brothers (half-white, half-Puetro Rican) whose parents have a complicated, sometimes violent relationship. Told from the perspective of the youngest and spanning several years, it is a story about sibling relationships but also identity and reconciling who you are and how that fits in the scope of your family. The prose is fascinating, somehow managing to be simple, abrasive, and beautiful all at once. Many times the story is told in first person plural, which also makes it interesting. (I've heard of a novel by Joshua Ferris called Then We Came to the End, that is supposed to be told entirely in first person plural and read that he (barely) pulled it off... Torres manages this point-of-view nicely since he blends it with first person singular so it is never a stretch.) It's an interesting book and the short length makes it an easy book to pick up and read quickly. (Though of course it took me twice as long as it took Alan. Go figure.)