Every Night Is Ladies' Night: Warm Stories of Ordinary Lives Searching for Love and Belonging

by Michael Jaime-Becerra

With a cast of characters so vivid they seem to leap from the page, this collection of linked short stories offers a portrait of individuals aching to find their place in an indifferent world. The characters who inhabit these stories -- teenagers, beauty queens, race car drivers, and even grandfathers -- fall in love, strive to make ends meet, or search for answers to their future while reconciling the past. Michael Jaime-Becerra casts a warm glow on each of them.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Contemporary

304 pages, Paperback

First published February 3, 2004

About the author

Michael Jaime-Becerra grew up in El Monte, California, a working-class suburb of Los Angeles. He received his MFA from the University of California, Irvine, and currently teaches creative writing at University of California, Riverside. His short-story collection, Every Night Is Ladies’ Night, was named one of the best of the year by The Washington Post and the San Francisco Chronicle. It was awarded a California Book Award, the Silver Medal for a First Work of Fiction. Michael is a winner of an International Latino Book Award. He lives in El Monte, California.

Reviews

[Chelseaahnae · Rating 5 out of 5]

well, I only have read the first chapter;

It starts off talking about this boy who likes this girl Violet.
It doesn't mention his name.
But it talks about his sister as well.
his sister is this girl who dates the wrong sort
of guys and gets into trouble - hangs out with a bad crowd...
Anyways, It's how his mom's so strict and
how his sister's always doing bad things.
and in the end of that one short story,
the sister runs away with her tatoo-artist of a boyfriend.

[Chloe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of inter-related short stories set in the Los Angeles County city of El Monte (shoutout to the San Gabriel Valley!) during the mid-1980s is nothing short of extraordinary. These aren't exciting stories where a lot happens with regards to plot or character arcs or much of that, and they aren't the kind of stories that guarantee you a happy ending, but after having read this book, I feel like Jaime-Becerra conjured up an entire community and a time and a place (or times & places) and invited me to step into their lives for a little while. I'm half convinced that he took real flesh and blood people and captured them in print. Thoroughly excellent.

[James (JD) Dittes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Becerra has set up a fully populated village here, with vivid characters of all ages and genres, and providing insights into Latinx culture on both sides of the border.

[Izzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

read for school, pretty good, wish i didn’t have to rush through it

[X · Rating 5 out of 5]

GREAT set of short stories. Can't recommend it enough. Its stories are a "community" (an interesting trend among many minority writers in the United States), meaning that characters, settings, thoughts, and histories reoccurr in different stories, allowing certain stories to enhance others and giving the collection a cohesion resembling that of a novel while retaining the vital characteristics of short stories. Every character in this collection is beautifully rendered, and they range from teenage girls to aging men. Jaime-Becerra also offers a complex depiction of Latino family culture and how today's Americanized youth struggles with it.

[Joshua Rigsby · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic collection of short stories. Jaime-Becerra's El Monte is a specific place that is accurately, meaningfully, and delightfully rendered. It deflates all the literary fluff that surrounds New York City as a subject and offers an honest portrayal of life in Southern California. I'd recommend it to anyone.

[Lysten_and_read · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this for a class, I enjoyed most of the stories in the book but some of them I found myself rereading sentences or just felt lost on what was going on. I like how most of the characters in the previous stories make an appearance.
This book isn’t one I’ll reread but somewhat enjoyed for it being an assigned book.

[Holly Dee · Rating 2 out of 5]

The prose is simple, the pieces are meandering, and the clever use of shock and subversion are abandoned in the latter pieces. I felt compassion and true dread at times, such as with "Gina and Max" and "Media Vuelta". But I felt disenchanted overall.

It doesn't accomplish anything spectacular or worth reading. Some of the pieces are quite strong ("Lopez Trucking Incorporated", "Every Night is Ladies' Night", "Media Vuelta") but they are outweighed by both their simplistic and straightforward storytelling as well as the unfortunate tedium of most of the pieces. The weakest one in this bunch is "La Fiesta Brava". After coming off of the heels of such an intimate and slow-churning piece, I would expect "La Fiesta Brava" to carry at least some weight and have been one of the stronger pieces. But it was sorely lacking. The conflict is not shocking, nor as exciting as Jaime-Becerra previously crafted within the pieces. I found myself skipping over many parts of this piece in order to get it over with and get to the climax. . .a climax wherein nothing interesting happened.

The endings of his pieces deteriorated throughout the collection. "Practice Tattoos" and "Every Night Is Ladies' Night" were such strong openers in this regard; they captured his ability to subvert expectations and provide payoff to underlying tensions. But this clever use of foreshadowing was abandoned in many of the other pieces, especially the last two. I think the author struggles with how to effectively end his stories, because even if I had felt some sort of compassion, it was often muted because of the endings. The endings seemed ready to launch right into another paragraph of meandering prose; they were not punchy or bold, instead utilizing the same structure as the entire piece. I suppose this could speak to the message of "Life goes on", but I found myself confused instead of satisfied.

It's unfortunate because Jaime-Becerra's most interesting storylines within this collection are later left up to reader interpretation or abandoned entirely. One of the stronger pieces, "Media Vuelta", is different in this regard, as it capitalizes on a previous tragedy we read earlier in the collection. This technique should have been used more, as it would have made the pieces much stronger and would have improved their (albeit loose) connectivity.

Not a huge fan of this book.

[Holly · Rating 3 out of 5]

These are very well-crafted stories about heart-breaking and true-to-life characters that feel as if they have been lifted straight from life. As in life, this means that intimate drama plays out on small stages. These are Los Angelos who are trying to make ends meet, who are lonely, who are looking for both romantic and filial love, who are trying (and failing) to fulfill the expectations of society. To me, these are stories of people who are stuck, in stasis; the path to the American dream is invisible if it existed at all. Many of the stories involved cars - cars as status symbols, as a way for men to impress women (and each other), cars as essential possession for a life in Los Angelos - without a car, people were even closer to the economic fringe. There are rules in these communities - women and men should not live together unless they are married; couples should not have sex until they are married; men should provide for their families; there's an expectation of masculinity. Of course these rules are broken time and again, characters disappointing those who love them.

[Nancy Hinsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Because I'm an American (gringa) now living in Baja, Mexico, I related to 90% of the stories told in this book. Each story has a link to the others, even if remotely and unimportantly.. The nuances of the Mexican culture, habits, sayings, pursuits and lifestyle are resplendently described and lauded. I had many laughs and several moments of deep compassion. The families are all living in Southern California, and we are treated to some of the history of their efforts to arrive there. Spanish phrases throughout add a true flavor. I enjoyed each of the short stories within. N

[Keri Murcray · Rating 3 out of 5]

These are not happy stories, but they are very well-written and draw you in. I appreciated the way the stories were linked mostly by place and sometimes by characters. These are real people, flawed and vulnerable. Another good choice for opening my worldview.

[Jillian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well-developed, interconnected short stories within one community. A fascinating peek into Latin cultures joys and woes with characters who shift from protagonists to peripheral ensemble. Charming and seamless, a great read.

[Cynthia Karpa McCarthy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I could write book reviews, I'd write one about this book. I like the author's spare but lyrical writing style. The characters are vivid without lengthy descriptions, especially Lencho, Mini, George, Etiwanda/Wanda...well, all of them. If I were to imagine myself in this book, I'd be the gringa lady standing in line for tacos with Lencho and his auto repair coworkers. I'm intrigued at how the author pull the reader into a book where not a lot happens except daily life moving at a regular pace. I'm not even finished reading it yet, but had to jump in with how glad I am my sister-in-law gave me this book after she finished reading it. She often does that, and I love all her recommendations, but this book is exceptional. When I finish this book, I'll have it cataloged in the library where I work and recommend it to readers.

[Mona Frazier · Rating 4 out of 5]

The characters and contemporary setting drawn by Becerra came alive as soon as I read the first pages. He is able to do this throughout the book with several different characters in different age groups, genders, and ethnicity. The chapters read like interconnected short stories where you discover people and places you may have never run into before. The writer does a great job of drawing characters from blue-collar lives into three dimensional people that you may have never stopped to talk too, unless you were raised in a low income area. I hope this writer produces more work.

[Janellyn51 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up because my friend Nan Goldin took the photo on the cover. It was well worth it. It was a bunch of short stories to do with El Monte Calif. It goes back and forth between Cal. and Mexico and the people drift in and out of one story, coming back in another. The characters are very well drawn. The author really has that thing where you can read a longish story and then it just ends on an odd note, not tying up loose ends, but still you know the characters keep going without you. I thought it was really well written and I liked the story with Juan Luis and Rubi the best I think.

[Kamala · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like collections of short stories that re-visit characters or that are set in the same location with different characters and this book does this really well. The stories, though I wouldn't say they do something totally new, are well-written, engaging and deal with a great variety of perspectives in a Mexican-American community in Southern California. I had a great time reading this even when I was super tired lying in bed or drunk lying in bed or even sitting up!

[Carly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although it took me a bit to become invested in this book, I'm glad I kept reading. The stories were subtly interconnected and, in my opinion, were an apt and relatable representation of Chicanos in the 80s (including the generational and cross cultural issues that come with being Mexican American in Southern California). The one problem I had with this book is the
cover, I have no idea why that particular picture was chosen and I feel like it misrepresents the book.

[Renee · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of 10 interconnected stories set in the hardscrabble, blue-collar town of El Monte captures the essence of Latino life in Southern California. After reading a few of the stories, I kept thinking to myself "can life really be this hard all of the time?" My only complaint is the stories ended too soon with very little closure. On the other hand, I'm sure Becerra intended such.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a really terrific collection of interconnected stories, very engrossing and lovely. It's sort of like a West Coast Mexican/Californian version of Junot Diaz' East Coast Dominican/New Jersey Drown.

[Gina Ruiz · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://ginasblogging.blogspot.com/200...

[Victoria Patterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A tender homage to El Monte, California. The author gives his characters a quiet dignity.

[Judi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love short stories. This is a collection that fleshes out the flavor and essence of the Latino community in the San Gabriel Valley . . . El Monte in particular. Another point of view of LA.

[victor]

i dug the first few stories and then lost the book which sucks because it's not my book.

[Steven Maus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent! The people within lead twisted lives in which they do their best against strings of bad luck and bad decisions.

[Liz · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm just not a short stories person...it's a major flaw in my reading character.

[Maria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent. Short stories with some continuing characters.

[Virg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Closer to 4.5. I don't think I've ever read anything that characterizes this part of Southern California as well.

[Karla Callejas c · Rating 3 out of 5]

Takes place in El Monte, California. Nice to read about familiar streets and places. If you enjoy this book, read Brandon Skyhorse's "Madonnas Of Echo Park".