Woman of Light
Kali Fajardo-Anstine
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Woman of Light
Kali Fajardo-Anstine
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
... rejects such simplicity, asking readers to consider the ways the past might move through and around each generation, emerging into the present in complicated ways.
I get that the term "transportive" is overused in blurbs, but I don’t know how else to describe this gorgeous novel from Kali Fajardo-Anstine. I was swept away by Woman of Light.
Combining extensive research with a propulsive narrative that spans decades, Fajardo-Anstine delivers a historical novel that never feels like a history lesson. She does so in prose often joyous and warm but unsparing in its depiction of oppression based on race, gender and class. Mysterious and vivid, Woman of Light is an extraordinary painting of a vibrant world both old and new..
Fajardo-Anstine deftly weaves in chronicles of Colorado and the American West throughout, allowing Luz’s ancestors to bear witness to the forces of Westward Expansion, political corruption, and poverty-driven migration.
... retains a mythic quality.
Fajardo-Anstine describes Denver with a pleasing solidity, its shops, bars and carnivals and small bands of enemies and allies carrying a detailed everyday heft. She offers a fascinatingly rich setting that depicts American western self-mythologisation in the making.
Fajardo-Anstine’s compelling writing paints a convincing portrait of a city in flux, haunted by white violence, and portrays a complex female friendship, a vivid love story (or three), and a story of family and memory in the American West..
Impressive if underdeveloped.
A sprawling novel.