RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewRemarkable ... The strength of her writing is only occasionally interrupted by repetition, and by a few graphic passages that might have benefited from a lighter touch ... There is historical value in this story of the daughter of two artists, whose personal lives we can now appreciate separately from their art. It is also refreshing to read a memoir of dysfunctional family and psychological disorder that is not self-pitying but raw, filled with sorrow, dark humor and sharp observation.
Mesha Maren
RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewDelivered in...measured yet stunning prose. It starts with a repeated phrase, \'they came by way of … ,\' which creates a strong musical cadence, guiding the reader through the opening passage like a river current ... This is the terrain of Cormac McCarthy, Pat Mora, Roberto Bolaño, Cristina Rivera Garza and the Mexican poet Jorge Humberto Chávez. Maren’s original descriptions of Ciudad Juárez and El Paso richly add to this literary heritage ... Some of the best-realized parts of the novel describe the intellectual friendships and conversations that develop when Elana and Alex meet a group of Mexican artists who embody a familiar oxymoron: cynical idealists ... Perpetual West is a meditation on a place where the prospect of disappearance and death is a constant fear. The novel is a rebuke to those — especially from the United States — who would romanticize these dangers, or see in the border culture primarily a means of self-discovery. In this respect, Perpetual West is a forceful addition to the literature of the U.S.-Mexican border and its ongoing history of tragedy and joy.
