The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBrideMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Honestly a 3.75 for me, but with some really strong sections between 4-5 stars. That's my biggest issue with the book--unevenness. Some of the characters are so well written: Moshe, Chona, Dodo, and even "Monkey Pants." There are everyday heroes and everyday criminals and that seems to be a lot of the point. In a small town in Pennsylvania people are living their stories as they intersect with ethnic and racial tensions that range from making assumptions to violence. The book dragged in places for me--I did not find Fatty and Big Soap as compelling as Nate, Paper, and some of the other sundry personalities. McBride town-builds (as opposed to world-builds) and does so very effectively. I just struggled with being teased by one thread only to have it supplanted by another less interesting one.
What is important, however, is that the book really drives home that the world (and race relations) is NOT black and white. People have intersectional identities that both enrich and complicate their narratives, and McBride zooms in on a town that acts as a microcosm of this more general truth. The "guy next door" is always going to be a lot of things, and how we bear witness to each other things makes (and sometimes breaks) a community.
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