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A Country You Can Leave
When sixteen-year-old Lara and her fiery mother, Yevgenia, find themselves homeless again, the misnamed Oasis Mobile Estates is all they can afford. In this new community, where residents are down on their luck but rich in humor and escape plans, Lara navigates what it means to be the Black, biracial daughter of a Russian mother and begins to wonder what a life beyond Yevgenia’s orbit—insistence on reading only the right kind of books (Russian), having the right kind of relationships (casual, with lots of sex)—might look like.
Lara knows that something else lies beneath her mother’s fierce, independent spirit, but Yevgenia doesn't believe in sharing, least of all with her daughter. When a brutal attack exposes the cracks in their relationship, Lara and Yevgenia are forced to confront the family legacy of violence and the strain of inherited trauma on the bonds of their love.
A Country You Can Leave is a dazzling, sharp-witted story, suffused with yearning, as Lara and Yevgenia attempt to forge their own identities and thrive in a hostile land. Compelling and empathetic, wry and intimate, Asale Angel-Ajani's unforgettable debut novel examines the beauty and dangers of womanhood in multiracial America.
Lara knows that something else lies beneath her mother’s fierce, independent spirit, but Yevgenia doesn't believe in sharing, least of all with her daughter. When a brutal attack exposes the cracks in their relationship, Lara and Yevgenia are forced to confront the family legacy of violence and the strain of inherited trauma on the bonds of their love.
A Country You Can Leave is a dazzling, sharp-witted story, suffused with yearning, as Lara and Yevgenia attempt to forge their own identities and thrive in a hostile land. Compelling and empathetic, wry and intimate, Asale Angel-Ajani's unforgettable debut novel examines the beauty and dangers of womanhood in multiracial America.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published February 21, 2023
45 people are currently reading
8816 people want to read
About the author
Asale Angel-Ajani
6 books64 followersAsale Angel-Ajani is the author of Strange Trade: The Story of Two Women Who Risked Everything in the International Drug Trade. She has held residencies at Millay, Djerassi, and Playa, and is an alum of VONA and Tin House. She is a professor at the City College of New York. A Country You Can Leave is her first novel.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 209 reviews
March 8, 2023
“My mother kept me, but she also tried passing me on to others, and that I won’t forget, despite her coming back. But when I needed her to let me go, begged her even, she wouldn’t. Not because she loved me, but because she needed company on her self- guided journey to misery.”
Sixteen-year-old Lara Montoya- Borislava and her mother Yevgenia rent a home at Oasis Mobile Estates after driving up from Nevada. Lara’s life lacks stability. Her mother Yevgenia is eccentric and lives life as she pleases, often leaving her daughter in the care of others while she is off with a new flame. When she does return, Yevgenia is constantly on the move, uprooting Lara time and time again. This time Lara hopes that they can settle down but she knows deep down that Yevgenia cannot be trusted. Yevgenia is erratic and self-absorbed and does not hesitate to use sex to get her own way. She is superficial and does not share much about herself and Lara acknowledges that she truly doesn’t understand her mother.
As the narrative continues, we follow Lara as she tries to settle down in her new home, deal with her mother’s alcoholism and neglect and forms new friendships in school and within the trailer park. The trailer park community in which she lives is rife with hardship, poverty and despair which often manifests in alcoholism, violence and substance abuse. But Lara also makes friends with people whose lives are very different from her own. In flashbacks, we get to know more about Lara’s life. Lara is biracial - her mother is a Russian immigrant and her father, with whom Lara has no contact, was a Black Cuban immigrant. Lara is used to questioning looks when people meet her and Yevgenia for the first time. Lara is also conscious of Yevgenia’s embarrassment in such situations which widens the divide between mother and daughter and deepens Lara’s curiosity about her father. Yevgenia rarely if ever expresses any affection or concern toward her daughter and her parenting mostly consists of quoting Russian literature and her very own maxims on life, sex and relationships that she writes in her notebook.
“The multicolored spiral- bound notebooks, their torn pages like slim fingers slipped through prison bars, taunt me. In these notebooks live my mother’s authoritarian edicts, philosophies, and communiqués, mostly regarding sex and men and politics and reading habits. The notebooks will be the sum total of her legacy and my meager inheritance.”
We can sense Lara’s longing for stability and desire for a better future but at the end of the day, she has no illusions about her life and situation. She is the responsible one among the two of them and is grounded in her reality which she knows is a harsh one. When Lara falls victim to a brutal act of violence, will this be the wake-up call Yevgenia needs? Will she take a stand for her daughter? Can Lara trust that her mother will be there for her or will this incident permanently fracture the relationship between mother and daughter?
A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani is a hard hitting debut. The author is unflinching in her description of a complicated (to put it mildly) mother-daughter relationship narrated from the PoV of a sixteen-year-old girl. At times you will be taken aback by how cynical Lara sounds, but given that she has Yevgenia for a mother that her bitterness would have an impact on Lara’s worldview is not surprising. Lara’s protectiveness towards her neighbor’s son Brody who she often babysits is an interesting dynamic that the author explores as are her friendships with Julie who belongs to an affluent family and Charles who is also a resident of the Oasis like Lara but aspires to break free. Her friends’ fascination with her mother and her home not only provides a few brief moments of levity but also surprises and frustrates Lara while also making her more conscious of her situation. Though this is a coming-of-age novel, what strikes you immediately is the lack of melodrama or teenage angst. Each chapter begins with Yevgenia’s words of “wisdom” and you can get an idea of what is to follow. The writer touches upon themes of racial identity, immigrant experiences, poverty, class distinction, sexuality, mental health, child neglect and much more with brutal honesty. In turn, you will feel heartbroken, shocked and angry as you turn the pages but you will keep rooting for Lara. Excellent writing, superb characterizations and fluid narrative render this a powerful debut that is as disturbing as it is compelling.
“The system may start outside, but it gets in. It’s a parasite, and we, the people of the Oasis, are its hosts. The system is in the cellular makeup of our bodies. It’s part of our psychology, our inherited traits, our human origins. We, the prostrate people of the Oasis, excel in the work of the system. We domesticate our suffering, neuter our aspirations. We detonate our fury so often at one another that we are depleted by the time we even think to look at the system. And yet, in small, fleeting moments, we may find the way back to our gaunt and ragged selves. We make grand declarations, vow to change the lives we think we steer. Then when we aren’t looking, we’re defeated. And for a few moments we’ll be stunned. How did we forget? Defeat always comes. In the drink we promise we won’t touch. The child we say we won’t beat. The job we vow to show up for.”
Sixteen-year-old Lara Montoya- Borislava and her mother Yevgenia rent a home at Oasis Mobile Estates after driving up from Nevada. Lara’s life lacks stability. Her mother Yevgenia is eccentric and lives life as she pleases, often leaving her daughter in the care of others while she is off with a new flame. When she does return, Yevgenia is constantly on the move, uprooting Lara time and time again. This time Lara hopes that they can settle down but she knows deep down that Yevgenia cannot be trusted. Yevgenia is erratic and self-absorbed and does not hesitate to use sex to get her own way. She is superficial and does not share much about herself and Lara acknowledges that she truly doesn’t understand her mother.
As the narrative continues, we follow Lara as she tries to settle down in her new home, deal with her mother’s alcoholism and neglect and forms new friendships in school and within the trailer park. The trailer park community in which she lives is rife with hardship, poverty and despair which often manifests in alcoholism, violence and substance abuse. But Lara also makes friends with people whose lives are very different from her own. In flashbacks, we get to know more about Lara’s life. Lara is biracial - her mother is a Russian immigrant and her father, with whom Lara has no contact, was a Black Cuban immigrant. Lara is used to questioning looks when people meet her and Yevgenia for the first time. Lara is also conscious of Yevgenia’s embarrassment in such situations which widens the divide between mother and daughter and deepens Lara’s curiosity about her father. Yevgenia rarely if ever expresses any affection or concern toward her daughter and her parenting mostly consists of quoting Russian literature and her very own maxims on life, sex and relationships that she writes in her notebook.
“The multicolored spiral- bound notebooks, their torn pages like slim fingers slipped through prison bars, taunt me. In these notebooks live my mother’s authoritarian edicts, philosophies, and communiqués, mostly regarding sex and men and politics and reading habits. The notebooks will be the sum total of her legacy and my meager inheritance.”
We can sense Lara’s longing for stability and desire for a better future but at the end of the day, she has no illusions about her life and situation. She is the responsible one among the two of them and is grounded in her reality which she knows is a harsh one. When Lara falls victim to a brutal act of violence, will this be the wake-up call Yevgenia needs? Will she take a stand for her daughter? Can Lara trust that her mother will be there for her or will this incident permanently fracture the relationship between mother and daughter?
A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani is a hard hitting debut. The author is unflinching in her description of a complicated (to put it mildly) mother-daughter relationship narrated from the PoV of a sixteen-year-old girl. At times you will be taken aback by how cynical Lara sounds, but given that she has Yevgenia for a mother that her bitterness would have an impact on Lara’s worldview is not surprising. Lara’s protectiveness towards her neighbor’s son Brody who she often babysits is an interesting dynamic that the author explores as are her friendships with Julie who belongs to an affluent family and Charles who is also a resident of the Oasis like Lara but aspires to break free. Her friends’ fascination with her mother and her home not only provides a few brief moments of levity but also surprises and frustrates Lara while also making her more conscious of her situation. Though this is a coming-of-age novel, what strikes you immediately is the lack of melodrama or teenage angst. Each chapter begins with Yevgenia’s words of “wisdom” and you can get an idea of what is to follow. The writer touches upon themes of racial identity, immigrant experiences, poverty, class distinction, sexuality, mental health, child neglect and much more with brutal honesty. In turn, you will feel heartbroken, shocked and angry as you turn the pages but you will keep rooting for Lara. Excellent writing, superb characterizations and fluid narrative render this a powerful debut that is as disturbing as it is compelling.
“The system may start outside, but it gets in. It’s a parasite, and we, the people of the Oasis, are its hosts. The system is in the cellular makeup of our bodies. It’s part of our psychology, our inherited traits, our human origins. We, the prostrate people of the Oasis, excel in the work of the system. We domesticate our suffering, neuter our aspirations. We detonate our fury so often at one another that we are depleted by the time we even think to look at the system. And yet, in small, fleeting moments, we may find the way back to our gaunt and ragged selves. We make grand declarations, vow to change the lives we think we steer. Then when we aren’t looking, we’re defeated. And for a few moments we’ll be stunned. How did we forget? Defeat always comes. In the drink we promise we won’t touch. The child we say we won’t beat. The job we vow to show up for.”
March 30, 2023
I am torn about how to rate A Country You Can Leave. The first half felt like Groundhog Day in a run down trailer park. Definitely three stars. But a few pages later the story sprang to life, with bold new story arcs, tensions rising, ultimately leading to a satisfying ending. Recommend. 3 1/2*
March 2, 2023
A Country You Can Leave was Asale Angel-Ajani’s debut novel. It was a well written, coming of age novel with unforgettable characters. I listened to the audiobook that was very well narrated by Amanda Cordner. It was about a mother/daughter relationship but so much more. It was told from the POV of the sixteen year old, biracial daughter, Lara. Having had grown up in a constant state of uncertainty, the turmoil of too many moves, the persistent fear of becoming homeless and the longing for a normal and stable life were the realities of Lara’s life for as long as she could remember. Her mother, Yevgenia, a Russian born woman, was not the warm and caring mother Lara envisioned for herself. Yevgenia, or Evie as she sometimes called herself, liked alcohol a little too much and was an avid reader of Russian literature. Lara’s mother dressed in provocative short and tight clothing and felt obliged to prepare Lara for the eventuality of sex, even though Lara was not the least bit ready. Yevgenia worked as a bartender and was often kinder to and more concerned with her customers than she was with her own daughter. Lara longed for what she would describe as a normal lifestyle. She wanted to go to school, make friends and have the kind of mother that possessed the tools for knowing how to be a good parent. As Lara and Yevgenia took refuge in yet another place to live, The Oasis Mobile Estates, would Lara be able to find the things she so desperately wanted there? At least, two of Lara’s wishes were granted. Lara was allowed to attend school and she had made two friends there. Unfortunately, the rest of Lara’s desires would not come easily. Lara would have to face terror, humiliation, embarrassment and fear for Yevgenia to finally step up and be the mother Lara had always dreamed of. Would mother and child be able to reconcile their relationship in a new way or would the fall back on their old ways?
A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani was a riveting and yet heartbreaking story. It covered issues like race, sexuality, the distinction between classes, role reversals between a mother and daughter, unwanted experiences, exposure to things children should be shielded from, choices, immigrants, exposure to drugs and alcohol and relationships that were both complex and complicated. I enjoyed listening to A Country You Can Leave and look forward to more books by Asale Angel-Ajani. I recommend this book very highly.
Thank you to Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani was a riveting and yet heartbreaking story. It covered issues like race, sexuality, the distinction between classes, role reversals between a mother and daughter, unwanted experiences, exposure to things children should be shielded from, choices, immigrants, exposure to drugs and alcohol and relationships that were both complex and complicated. I enjoyed listening to A Country You Can Leave and look forward to more books by Asale Angel-Ajani. I recommend this book very highly.
Thank you to Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
October 29, 2022
Why am I the first to rate and review this? Can my praises change that? Let’s find out.
A family can be very much like a country. For one thing, it can be difficult to leave. But also…best case scenario, it can provide a sense of belonging and pride, somewhere to be safe, loved, taken care of. At worst…well, it can make for some terrific literature.
That’s what this book is…terrific. Stunning. Awesome.
There are plenty of mother/daughter relationship stories out there and most of it falls prey to cheap sentimentality, triteness, clichés. This novel does none of it, averting every pitfall along the way with expertise of a car race driver…something especially notable for a debut, and resulting in a story that hits all the right notes and then tears the strings out. Bam. Done. Make of it what you will.
This novel is unapologetically unsentimental, unflinchingly visceral, and unorthodoxly about love. Albeit, love – the real thing, the kind that guts and scars.
A most courageous endeavor and a most courageous novel about it.
Don’t make a mistake of dismissing it as just a coming-of-age novel either, although the narrator is sixteen. There’s nothing teen or twee about it.
Lara is a smart kid who has been denied any semblance of a normal life for so long, that she ends up craving it desperately. Alas, with a mother like hers - an embittered émigré, emotionally crippled by childhood abuse, intellectually frustrated well-read pentalingual, promiscuous, alcoholic, daring, wildly unconventional and seemingly comprised of razor blades and edges – normalcy is an impossible thing.
When the two of them come to their most recent temporary landing at the Oasis trailer park in California desert, things at long boil over, all the frustrations, all the resentments, all the misunderstandings.
What a book. What a powerhouse of a book. Absolutely riveting. If you follow my reviews (and you really should ;) ) you know how many books I read and this was a definitive standout among them. The way this author writes, the emotional punches she throws…just wow.
The characters of this book come alive, every wrinkle, every flaw, every aspect of beauty. Especially the main two. Especially the mother. The way the author (who isn’t Eastern European it seems) gets the dark melancholy of the Slavic soul – it’s poetry in motion. Many kudos.
This novel is what looks and hopes for in proper literary fiction. Recommended. Thanks Netgalley.
This and more at https://advancetheplot.weebly.com/
A family can be very much like a country. For one thing, it can be difficult to leave. But also…best case scenario, it can provide a sense of belonging and pride, somewhere to be safe, loved, taken care of. At worst…well, it can make for some terrific literature.
That’s what this book is…terrific. Stunning. Awesome.
There are plenty of mother/daughter relationship stories out there and most of it falls prey to cheap sentimentality, triteness, clichés. This novel does none of it, averting every pitfall along the way with expertise of a car race driver…something especially notable for a debut, and resulting in a story that hits all the right notes and then tears the strings out. Bam. Done. Make of it what you will.
This novel is unapologetically unsentimental, unflinchingly visceral, and unorthodoxly about love. Albeit, love – the real thing, the kind that guts and scars.
A most courageous endeavor and a most courageous novel about it.
Don’t make a mistake of dismissing it as just a coming-of-age novel either, although the narrator is sixteen. There’s nothing teen or twee about it.
Lara is a smart kid who has been denied any semblance of a normal life for so long, that she ends up craving it desperately. Alas, with a mother like hers - an embittered émigré, emotionally crippled by childhood abuse, intellectually frustrated well-read pentalingual, promiscuous, alcoholic, daring, wildly unconventional and seemingly comprised of razor blades and edges – normalcy is an impossible thing.
When the two of them come to their most recent temporary landing at the Oasis trailer park in California desert, things at long boil over, all the frustrations, all the resentments, all the misunderstandings.
What a book. What a powerhouse of a book. Absolutely riveting. If you follow my reviews (and you really should ;) ) you know how many books I read and this was a definitive standout among them. The way this author writes, the emotional punches she throws…just wow.
The characters of this book come alive, every wrinkle, every flaw, every aspect of beauty. Especially the main two. Especially the mother. The way the author (who isn’t Eastern European it seems) gets the dark melancholy of the Slavic soul – it’s poetry in motion. Many kudos.
This novel is what looks and hopes for in proper literary fiction. Recommended. Thanks Netgalley.
This and more at https://advancetheplot.weebly.com/
December 23, 2022
This wasn’t an easy read for me. I’m Russian, and I have a daughter - the relationship at the center of this novel is unimaginable. I didn’t understand this mother at all. But the references to some cultural “treasures” - she knows Victor Tsoi! - were lots of fun.
February 14, 2024
This is listed as a coming of age story but I found it to be mostly an exploration of the relationship between the mother and the child and of life as a neglected child. I liked that Angel-Ajani resisted the tendency to over-dramatize the feelings associated with neglect that too often make such narratives cringe inducing, but it also made the reading experience a little hard to approach.
Not the easiest read but one that asks you to sit with it and contemplate its study in nuance.
Not the easiest read but one that asks you to sit with it and contemplate its study in nuance.
May 7, 2023
A mother-daughter relationship is explored in this disturbing story of hardship, poverty, longing, and intergenerational trauma. Yevgenia (Evie) is a white Russian immigrant and fiery alcoholic who came to the US by accident. Her sixteen-year-old daughter, Lara, is a Cuban, Black biracial teen who wants nothing more than a secure foundation at home, a demonstration of love and mothering from Yevgenia, and, at times, to find her father. The two are itinerants, never laying roots, with Evie escaping one place for another when finances and chaos get dire. The narrative lacks a coherent plot—it’s more a series of desultory events and scenes in a seedy trailer park-- but at the heart is a consistent theme of identity and belonging—the pursuit by a teenager of an indifferent and distant mother. The year is 2000, a new century but an old, stubborn playbook that Yevgenia wields.
As the book opens, they are starting over (again) in the desert landscape of southern California, in a run-down trailer park of quirky and outcast inhabitants. Yevgenia dresses inappropriately and tacky for her age in order to emphasize and utilize her sexuality, and she parents Lara by pontificating nuggets of Russian literature--her only sacred bedrock of belief-- keeping notebooks of her edicts and philosophies, her legacy to Lara. She tries to taunt her daughter (a virgin) to have a sex life—even to compete with her. For Yevgenia, manipulating men is a serious game. Once, she left Lara for two years in the hands of strangers in order to run off with a man. She returned, unapologetic and ready for the next adventure.
“My mother kept me, but she also tried passing me on to others, and that I won’t forget, despite her coming back. But when I needed her to let me go, begged her even, she wouldn’t. Not because she loved me, but because she needed company on her self- guided journey to misery.”
Evie’s life is a mess, but her books and her intellect define her. She quotes and lectures from various Russian authors as a way of substitute parenting to Lara, but it comes off as cold, cringey, and indifferent. She doesn't protect Lara from the pointed prejudices that her daughter endures, repeatedly. Yevgenia acts blind to race--she thinks everything is determined by class, and she has her own definitions of that, too. Yevgenia holds onto secrets that add to the many walls between them. She is often kinder and more compassionate to strangers than she is to her daughter. However, when it comes to physical abuse, she won't tolerate anyone laying a finger on Lara or anyone important to her life.
Lara desires friends, but her overbearing mother intrudes on her friendship with Charles, a Black gay fellow student and aspiring writer. Yevgenia soon takes over as Charles’ informal instructor in the arts, often leaving Lara in the metaphorical corner. Lara wants her mother to mother her, to show compassion and love. However, when not working shifts at the bar, Evie is frequently drunk and vulgar, showboating her frank sexuality that Lara fears could be dangerous. This behavior often leads to a role reversal, Lara having to take care of Evie and ensure their safety. As the denouement approaches, violence is an inexorable interloper that forces Yevgenia and Lara to make clear and serious decisions about their relationship, as Lara definitively comes of age in a harrowing and inevitable conclusion. Don’t expect this to tie up in a tidy bow.
The first line of the book comes from one of Yevgenia’s notebooks, a key kernel into her imperious axioms: “There is no release from life’s turmoil, so put your back into it.”
As the book opens, they are starting over (again) in the desert landscape of southern California, in a run-down trailer park of quirky and outcast inhabitants. Yevgenia dresses inappropriately and tacky for her age in order to emphasize and utilize her sexuality, and she parents Lara by pontificating nuggets of Russian literature--her only sacred bedrock of belief-- keeping notebooks of her edicts and philosophies, her legacy to Lara. She tries to taunt her daughter (a virgin) to have a sex life—even to compete with her. For Yevgenia, manipulating men is a serious game. Once, she left Lara for two years in the hands of strangers in order to run off with a man. She returned, unapologetic and ready for the next adventure.
“My mother kept me, but she also tried passing me on to others, and that I won’t forget, despite her coming back. But when I needed her to let me go, begged her even, she wouldn’t. Not because she loved me, but because she needed company on her self- guided journey to misery.”
Evie’s life is a mess, but her books and her intellect define her. She quotes and lectures from various Russian authors as a way of substitute parenting to Lara, but it comes off as cold, cringey, and indifferent. She doesn't protect Lara from the pointed prejudices that her daughter endures, repeatedly. Yevgenia acts blind to race--she thinks everything is determined by class, and she has her own definitions of that, too. Yevgenia holds onto secrets that add to the many walls between them. She is often kinder and more compassionate to strangers than she is to her daughter. However, when it comes to physical abuse, she won't tolerate anyone laying a finger on Lara or anyone important to her life.
Lara desires friends, but her overbearing mother intrudes on her friendship with Charles, a Black gay fellow student and aspiring writer. Yevgenia soon takes over as Charles’ informal instructor in the arts, often leaving Lara in the metaphorical corner. Lara wants her mother to mother her, to show compassion and love. However, when not working shifts at the bar, Evie is frequently drunk and vulgar, showboating her frank sexuality that Lara fears could be dangerous. This behavior often leads to a role reversal, Lara having to take care of Evie and ensure their safety. As the denouement approaches, violence is an inexorable interloper that forces Yevgenia and Lara to make clear and serious decisions about their relationship, as Lara definitively comes of age in a harrowing and inevitable conclusion. Don’t expect this to tie up in a tidy bow.
The first line of the book comes from one of Yevgenia’s notebooks, a key kernel into her imperious axioms: “There is no release from life’s turmoil, so put your back into it.”
October 14, 2023
This is one of those books that leaves you a little unsure on how you're feeling — part of me celebrates the representation that's included in "A Country You Can Leave," as it unfolds the story of a very marginalized experience of racism, neglect, and homelessness. The other part of me honestly just could not wait for this book to be over.
Teenage Lara and her mother Yevgenia are looking to start a new chapter in the Oasis Mobile Estates trailer home park, following a turbulent history of homelessness and false starts. As a Black, biracial daughter to Russian Yevgneia (Evie), Lara experiences her share of micro-aggressions, both in her history and as she settles into her new life and school. Much of the novel is about Lara and Yevgneia's complicated relationship, where self-centered and eccentric Yevgneia, in her quest for survival, seems more interested in sex and her Russian literature than in making sure that Lara thrives.
The book itself feels somewhat meandering, with no strong plot to anchor it, and feels more like a teenager's snapshot observations on life. There's a good deal of cringe in witnessing the life lessons that Yevgenia passes along to Lara. Lara's life feels grim, and that gives this book a trudging heaviness I often felt reluctant to return to, no matter how well written it is.
Teenage Lara and her mother Yevgenia are looking to start a new chapter in the Oasis Mobile Estates trailer home park, following a turbulent history of homelessness and false starts. As a Black, biracial daughter to Russian Yevgneia (Evie), Lara experiences her share of micro-aggressions, both in her history and as she settles into her new life and school. Much of the novel is about Lara and Yevgneia's complicated relationship, where self-centered and eccentric Yevgneia, in her quest for survival, seems more interested in sex and her Russian literature than in making sure that Lara thrives.
The book itself feels somewhat meandering, with no strong plot to anchor it, and feels more like a teenager's snapshot observations on life. There's a good deal of cringe in witnessing the life lessons that Yevgenia passes along to Lara. Lara's life feels grim, and that gives this book a trudging heaviness I often felt reluctant to return to, no matter how well written it is.
June 11, 2023
Asale Angel-Ajani's remarkable debut, A COUNTRY YOU CAN LEAVE —centers around a mother and daughter duo trapped by circumstances. Lyrical, raw, emotional, and often heartfelt, yet witty.
I LOVED the opening of each chapter with life rules to follow (from the spiral-bound notebooks) by the mom for her daughter! Lessons about sex, men, politics, and reading habits—her meager inheritance)—Hilarious! a highlight of this well-written novel. I bookmarked many pages and was fortunate to have the e-book to accompany the audiobook!
Lara is a sixteen-year-old biracial teen girl with an eccentric fiery Russian mom, Yevgenia. From one job and town to another (always on the move), from one dead-end position to another, just trying to survive.
Accustomed to being homeless and her mom taking off, they are now at the rundown Oasis Mobile Home Park in the California desert.
"A desert is a place that lulls a person into believing that nothing is required of them until it's nearly too late, and suddenly, you need all of your faculties to survive."
It is difficult for Lara to have friends since they move around a lot. She does not fit in. The mother-daughter duo has a love/hate relationship. Lara feels her mom does not love her and is embarrassed because she is black. Lara wants to know more about her dad (a Black schizophrenic gifted Cuban musician).
Her mom, a bartender, is loose, loud-mouthed, opinionated, an alcoholic, well-read, wild, unconventional, and enjoys sex. She pays more attention to customers and Lara's friends than she does to her daughter.
She reads a lot, and some might even be impressed with her knowledge. She constantly quotes Russian literature and is not interested in providing a stable, secure home in a traditional sense.
The mom does not like Americans or men (edicts laid out in the notebook quotes). She believes in tough love and has no compassion for others. She is loud and vocal with a foul trashy mouth. One of Lara's friends even called her very "cosmopolitan."
Told from Lara's POV, she loves to read. She is affected by her mother as all she knows. I loved her friend, Charles, the budding poet, and their experience with the literary scene.
The mother-daughter relationship is complex. There are heated arguments, frustrations, misunderstandings, and resentments.
Even though Lara appreciates her mom's independent spirit, she is not the sharing type. In Lara's quest to find her dad, a brutal attack brings some of her mom's past trauma to the surface. Lara finds her life full of confusion and contradictions. Lara wants her mom's acceptance.
Lara has relied on her mom, but now she has an impulse to pull away to discover her own self-identity.
Topics: Immigrants, culture, race, class, mental health, poverty, acceptance, mother-daughter relationships. I loved the ending!
A COUNTRY YOU CAN LEAVE packs an emotional punch. Told with passion and humor. Sharp-witted with a colorful cast of fun characters, a compelling yet eye-opening realistic view of the obstacles faced by multiracials. A world of desperation and beauty.
I enjoyed the love of books, literary aspects, and reading portrayed throughout the book. The memories of books and stories have the power to shape our lives.
The author's writing is poetic, lyrical, and stunning. The author has been added to my favorite author list, and I cannot wait to see what comes next. This is different from your ordinary coming of age. It is explosive! I would love to see another book like this written from the mom's perspective.
AUDIOBOOK: thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook narrated by Amanda Cordner for an outstanding performance and listening experience. Highly entertaining.
For fans of books, I have read most recently: Margot, Maame, and The Applicant. I listened to the audiobook of all four of these and highly recommend them.
Thank you to #MacmillanAudio, #FarrarStrausandGiroux #MCD, and #Netgalley for a gifted ALC and ARC. #covercrush
Blog Review Posted@
www.JudithDCollins.com
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 4 Stars
Pub Date: Feb 21, 2023
Feb 2023 Must-Read Books
Check out the fascinating Interview with Asale Angel-Ajani with Literary Hub.
I LOVED the opening of each chapter with life rules to follow (from the spiral-bound notebooks) by the mom for her daughter! Lessons about sex, men, politics, and reading habits—her meager inheritance)—Hilarious! a highlight of this well-written novel. I bookmarked many pages and was fortunate to have the e-book to accompany the audiobook!
Lara is a sixteen-year-old biracial teen girl with an eccentric fiery Russian mom, Yevgenia. From one job and town to another (always on the move), from one dead-end position to another, just trying to survive.
Accustomed to being homeless and her mom taking off, they are now at the rundown Oasis Mobile Home Park in the California desert.
"A desert is a place that lulls a person into believing that nothing is required of them until it's nearly too late, and suddenly, you need all of your faculties to survive."
It is difficult for Lara to have friends since they move around a lot. She does not fit in. The mother-daughter duo has a love/hate relationship. Lara feels her mom does not love her and is embarrassed because she is black. Lara wants to know more about her dad (a Black schizophrenic gifted Cuban musician).
Her mom, a bartender, is loose, loud-mouthed, opinionated, an alcoholic, well-read, wild, unconventional, and enjoys sex. She pays more attention to customers and Lara's friends than she does to her daughter.
She reads a lot, and some might even be impressed with her knowledge. She constantly quotes Russian literature and is not interested in providing a stable, secure home in a traditional sense.
The mom does not like Americans or men (edicts laid out in the notebook quotes). She believes in tough love and has no compassion for others. She is loud and vocal with a foul trashy mouth. One of Lara's friends even called her very "cosmopolitan."
Told from Lara's POV, she loves to read. She is affected by her mother as all she knows. I loved her friend, Charles, the budding poet, and their experience with the literary scene.
The mother-daughter relationship is complex. There are heated arguments, frustrations, misunderstandings, and resentments.
Even though Lara appreciates her mom's independent spirit, she is not the sharing type. In Lara's quest to find her dad, a brutal attack brings some of her mom's past trauma to the surface. Lara finds her life full of confusion and contradictions. Lara wants her mom's acceptance.
Lara has relied on her mom, but now she has an impulse to pull away to discover her own self-identity.
Topics: Immigrants, culture, race, class, mental health, poverty, acceptance, mother-daughter relationships. I loved the ending!
A COUNTRY YOU CAN LEAVE packs an emotional punch. Told with passion and humor. Sharp-witted with a colorful cast of fun characters, a compelling yet eye-opening realistic view of the obstacles faced by multiracials. A world of desperation and beauty.
I enjoyed the love of books, literary aspects, and reading portrayed throughout the book. The memories of books and stories have the power to shape our lives.
The author's writing is poetic, lyrical, and stunning. The author has been added to my favorite author list, and I cannot wait to see what comes next. This is different from your ordinary coming of age. It is explosive! I would love to see another book like this written from the mom's perspective.
AUDIOBOOK: thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook narrated by Amanda Cordner for an outstanding performance and listening experience. Highly entertaining.
For fans of books, I have read most recently: Margot, Maame, and The Applicant. I listened to the audiobook of all four of these and highly recommend them.
Thank you to #MacmillanAudio, #FarrarStrausandGiroux #MCD, and #Netgalley for a gifted ALC and ARC. #covercrush
Blog Review Posted@
www.JudithDCollins.com
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 4 Stars
Pub Date: Feb 21, 2023
Feb 2023 Must-Read Books
Check out the fascinating Interview with Asale Angel-Ajani with Literary Hub.
January 13, 2023
A Country You Can Leave by Asale Angel-Ajani. Thanks to @fsgbooks and @netgalley for the gifted Arc ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Lara and her flamboyant mother have known what it’s like to move around. When they land at a down on their luck trailer community, it’s up to Lara to navigate live as a biracial teen.
I love a story about the mother and daughter relationship. This was a difficult one to read but I enjoyed it. It’s pretty dreary and not very hopeful, but you feel for the main character the whole way. I would love another book of this but more from the mother’s perspective. That would be so interesting as well.
“Sometimes you have to play nice to get what you want. But always carry a knife in your back pocket. Importantly, be ready to use it.”
A Country You can Leave comes out 2/17.
Lara and her flamboyant mother have known what it’s like to move around. When they land at a down on their luck trailer community, it’s up to Lara to navigate live as a biracial teen.
I love a story about the mother and daughter relationship. This was a difficult one to read but I enjoyed it. It’s pretty dreary and not very hopeful, but you feel for the main character the whole way. I would love another book of this but more from the mother’s perspective. That would be so interesting as well.
“Sometimes you have to play nice to get what you want. But always carry a knife in your back pocket. Importantly, be ready to use it.”
A Country You can Leave comes out 2/17.
May 4, 2023
I found this not only very enjoyable to read, but very different from any story of similar genres that I’ve read before. Powerful and moving, and heartbreaking in the best way.
April 6, 2023
I love books like this where the author takes the reader to a place that is often overlooked in literature and writes in a very raw, gritty, authentic style. There's no sugarcoating the lives of Yevgenia and Lara. This is not a happy or uplifting novel; it's not littered with sappy romance. It provides the reader with some brutal, harsh realities. It reminded me a lot of "Abundance" by Jakob Guanzon.
January 9, 2023
4.5 rounded down
It's the year 2000, and 16-year-old Lara and her mother, Yevgenia, find themselves in the Oasis Mobile Estates in rural America. Lara, Yevgenia's only daughter, is biracial and has never met her father, her mother absent for extended periods of her childhood. She wonders if this new trailer park will signal a fresh start for her, a place to settle down and make new friends - however Yevgenia, a Russian immigrant who lives to her own set of self-prescribed rules she likes to share with her daughter - does not seem destined to change her ways. Until one day a horrific attack changes everything and the mother and daughter are forced to reassess their fractious bond.
A coming of age narrative which presents a unique mother/daughter relationship but which never verges on sentimentality. Not an easy read, but highly recommended.
Thank you Netgalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the advance copy, which was provided in exchange for an honest review.
It's the year 2000, and 16-year-old Lara and her mother, Yevgenia, find themselves in the Oasis Mobile Estates in rural America. Lara, Yevgenia's only daughter, is biracial and has never met her father, her mother absent for extended periods of her childhood. She wonders if this new trailer park will signal a fresh start for her, a place to settle down and make new friends - however Yevgenia, a Russian immigrant who lives to her own set of self-prescribed rules she likes to share with her daughter - does not seem destined to change her ways. Until one day a horrific attack changes everything and the mother and daughter are forced to reassess their fractious bond.
A coming of age narrative which presents a unique mother/daughter relationship but which never verges on sentimentality. Not an easy read, but highly recommended.
Thank you Netgalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the advance copy, which was provided in exchange for an honest review.
July 20, 2023
This is a beautiful but bittersweet debut about Lara, who is biracial and her Russian mother Yevgenia. Living in a trailer park called The Oasis, sixteen-year-old Lara never knows what to expect from her mother who loves her but must make ends meet and is often not around to parent her daughter. And so Lara learns from her friends, learns what she does NOT want to be from her friends and her mom's "boyfriends." It's poignant and deep, often painful to read as we long for Lara to have a "normal" childhood without being bailed out of jail or beating up someone threatening her choices. My heart wept for Lara as no one should have to endure growing up like this, but it's also a testament to the resilience and fortitude that resides deep inside ones soul; and it's what makes us human!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!
February 8, 2023
This story centers around the complicated mother/daughter relationship between a biracial Black teenage daughter and her Russian immigrant mother. Not an easy read, but I was drawn in.
The mom is a chaotic intellectual, constantly spouting quotes from Russian literature whilst also leading a promiscuous sex life and generally wreaking havoc. She’s done nothing to provide a stable, safe home for her daughter or give her a strong sense of identity. Though the daughter is our narrator, because she is so young and dependent, I feel like the story revolves around the mother and how her choices have affected her daughter. I felt like the plot was a little lacking but the character development and the portrayal of the relationships between characters was very strong.
I listened to a advanced copy of the audiobook, thanks to MacMillan Audio via Netgalley. Personally I would have loved if the narrator had used a Russian accent for the mom! Her American accent threw me, especially considering that her character’s disdain for the US comes through very strong throughout the book. It felt odd for her to not have her own “voice.” I think I might have preferred to read this one in a traditional book format for that reason.
The mom is a chaotic intellectual, constantly spouting quotes from Russian literature whilst also leading a promiscuous sex life and generally wreaking havoc. She’s done nothing to provide a stable, safe home for her daughter or give her a strong sense of identity. Though the daughter is our narrator, because she is so young and dependent, I feel like the story revolves around the mother and how her choices have affected her daughter. I felt like the plot was a little lacking but the character development and the portrayal of the relationships between characters was very strong.
I listened to a advanced copy of the audiobook, thanks to MacMillan Audio via Netgalley. Personally I would have loved if the narrator had used a Russian accent for the mom! Her American accent threw me, especially considering that her character’s disdain for the US comes through very strong throughout the book. It felt odd for her to not have her own “voice.” I think I might have preferred to read this one in a traditional book format for that reason.
March 29, 2023
4.5 ⭐s 💖😍
April 15, 2023
Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for accepting my request to audibly read and review A Country You Can Leave.
Narrated by Amanda Cordner
Published: 02/21/23
Another read where my time was well spent. The subject matter makes it inappropriate to say I enjoyed this, etc. This is the author's debut novel, and hats off for writing a story that I believed. With the parameters given in the synopsis, the story could have gone many different ways.
The author took me places in my soul that hurt. This is more than a biracial girl and her single mother. The victim blaming days need to be in the past. I think the author understands this. Blaming the mother, again an unproductive path.
There is a lot of pain, sorrow, and embarrassing moments in the story. Everything written is plausible. After reading, the question is now what? The author has written quite well a survival story, and no guide or guidelines are available. Thus surviving is all there will ever be.
There is a lot of profanity, and while I don't like it, I understand for the purposes of believability it was necessary. This potentially is one of less than ten books in my lifetime of reading where I would question the validity of the accounts -- given the same writing style if the cultural standards were not consistently met.
Author Asale Angel-Ajani has written a telling story, one that will stay with me. I look forward to your next novel.
Great choice on Amanda Cordner.
Narrated by Amanda Cordner
Published: 02/21/23
Another read where my time was well spent. The subject matter makes it inappropriate to say I enjoyed this, etc. This is the author's debut novel, and hats off for writing a story that I believed. With the parameters given in the synopsis, the story could have gone many different ways.
The author took me places in my soul that hurt. This is more than a biracial girl and her single mother. The victim blaming days need to be in the past. I think the author understands this. Blaming the mother, again an unproductive path.
There is a lot of pain, sorrow, and embarrassing moments in the story. Everything written is plausible. After reading, the question is now what? The author has written quite well a survival story, and no guide or guidelines are available. Thus surviving is all there will ever be.
There is a lot of profanity, and while I don't like it, I understand for the purposes of believability it was necessary. This potentially is one of less than ten books in my lifetime of reading where I would question the validity of the accounts -- given the same writing style if the cultural standards were not consistently met.
Author Asale Angel-Ajani has written a telling story, one that will stay with me. I look forward to your next novel.
Great choice on Amanda Cordner.
September 15, 2024
Beautifully written, but devastatingly sad. This story follows a mother haunted by her own trauma while grappling with having a daughter of her own. Feeling chained to motherhood in an indescribable way. The daughter, Lara, merely tries to survive her mother and the choices she makes. A heartbreaking story of repeated cycles, loss, and poverty. I give it three stars because the writing is excellent, but the story itself is very depressing. But sometimes, I think, isn’t that the point? Isn’t it important to read how truly devastating the world can be? It can be easy to ignore, but we need to see it all.
February 23, 2023
4.25 stars!
March 7, 2023
3.5
Well written but not overly enjoyable to read. I found myself just wanting to be done it.
Well written but not overly enjoyable to read. I found myself just wanting to be done it.
July 3, 2023
Changed my mind on DNFing this one... That wasn't the best call I've made.
June 20, 2023
"Within me, a brewing concern that admiration is an ambush. I want to collect the small pieces of Charles, those that belong to the regular Black American kid that he leaves on the floor when he walks off the stage."
"I understand that his loneliness is a lot like mine, carefully pruned like a prizewinning bonsai, gifted to us by people who are adults in name only."
"Death has not been on my mind, so I know that the passage has pulled me in with its honest assessment of living. Who'll bother about the likes of you?"
"It's then that I know something essential about myself. I will not live a lie. I will not contort to the will of others. Or adhere to their vision of what I should be doing or how I should be acting."
"I wonder if Papa Bear knows when to surrender, if maybe now he sees for himself that none of his horizons include my mother. But he keeps playing. And I gain more understanding of how weakness repels."
"...when he remembers to stand in line for food and on the bad days when he is snatched up again by police for vagrancy or trespassing or something more, he will know that I looked for him exactly one time and that I never came back."
These are just a few quotes that touched me. This was an unexpected, exceptional novel that can only be read fully to understand just how impactful it truly is. I will forever remember this character and her mother long into the future. It's the kind of book that aspires you to become a better writer just so that your work can sound as amazing as Angel-Ajani's.
The story of mother-daughter relationships and connections is strongly presented in this novel so if you have any familial trauma or you enjoy reading books like Little Fires Everywhere then this is the best book for you.
"I understand that his loneliness is a lot like mine, carefully pruned like a prizewinning bonsai, gifted to us by people who are adults in name only."
"Death has not been on my mind, so I know that the passage has pulled me in with its honest assessment of living. Who'll bother about the likes of you?"
"It's then that I know something essential about myself. I will not live a lie. I will not contort to the will of others. Or adhere to their vision of what I should be doing or how I should be acting."
"I wonder if Papa Bear knows when to surrender, if maybe now he sees for himself that none of his horizons include my mother. But he keeps playing. And I gain more understanding of how weakness repels."
"...when he remembers to stand in line for food and on the bad days when he is snatched up again by police for vagrancy or trespassing or something more, he will know that I looked for him exactly one time and that I never came back."
These are just a few quotes that touched me. This was an unexpected, exceptional novel that can only be read fully to understand just how impactful it truly is. I will forever remember this character and her mother long into the future. It's the kind of book that aspires you to become a better writer just so that your work can sound as amazing as Angel-Ajani's.
The story of mother-daughter relationships and connections is strongly presented in this novel so if you have any familial trauma or you enjoy reading books like Little Fires Everywhere then this is the best book for you.
December 1, 2022
A COUNTRY YOU CAN LEAVE |
Lara, a Black biracial daughter with an eccentric, alcoholic Russian mom teeters in an uncomfortable state of longing and belonging, tied to a mother who can't truly understand her and a racist world that has her marked.
The mom is an intellectual, who can quote Pushkin, Dostoyevsky and Wittgenstein, sit for hours philosophizing in multiple languages, and very scornful of America and men. Each chapter has a dictum that's been written by her mom to Lara. She's fierce and trashy. She wears Juicy tracksuits and too tight tube tops and always seems to want to prove a point to her daughter even if that means putting her daughter at risk. On the one hand, we can feel how fiercely she loves her daughter. But on the other, we know and hope that Lara figures out her mother is not a good mother for her.
The other major harm is our racist world that we live in, which is made even more harmful by a mom that can't see how racist it is for her daughter. Yet for all her intellectual brooding smarts, the mom is incapable of picking up on the fact that the world is a very different type of dangerous to her daughter. Peripherally, she can recognize as a white passing woman how she is perceived walking around with a Black daughter, and what types of judgement may be passed on her, which she well presses into, but she can't see or worse yet, doesn't have the willingness to exert the love and energy to care for her daughter in a way that can lend real protection and love against a cruel and racist world.
I loved the writing in this book and I loved the relationship between Lara and her mom, Lara and her 2 friends. This was a beautiful book.
TW: There is a scene later in the book with physical assault
Lara, a Black biracial daughter with an eccentric, alcoholic Russian mom teeters in an uncomfortable state of longing and belonging, tied to a mother who can't truly understand her and a racist world that has her marked.
The mom is an intellectual, who can quote Pushkin, Dostoyevsky and Wittgenstein, sit for hours philosophizing in multiple languages, and very scornful of America and men. Each chapter has a dictum that's been written by her mom to Lara. She's fierce and trashy. She wears Juicy tracksuits and too tight tube tops and always seems to want to prove a point to her daughter even if that means putting her daughter at risk. On the one hand, we can feel how fiercely she loves her daughter. But on the other, we know and hope that Lara figures out her mother is not a good mother for her.
The other major harm is our racist world that we live in, which is made even more harmful by a mom that can't see how racist it is for her daughter. Yet for all her intellectual brooding smarts, the mom is incapable of picking up on the fact that the world is a very different type of dangerous to her daughter. Peripherally, she can recognize as a white passing woman how she is perceived walking around with a Black daughter, and what types of judgement may be passed on her, which she well presses into, but she can't see or worse yet, doesn't have the willingness to exert the love and energy to care for her daughter in a way that can lend real protection and love against a cruel and racist world.
I loved the writing in this book and I loved the relationship between Lara and her mom, Lara and her 2 friends. This was a beautiful book.
TW: There is a scene later in the book with physical assault
February 2, 2023
I received an ARC from Goodreads ❤️
This is a book about generational trauma, living at the borders of the world, and growing from girlhood to womanhood.
I devoured this in a handful of days, becoming immersed in Lara and her mother Yevgenia’s relationship. Lara knows all along the kind of person that her mother is, but it broke my heart to watch her be confronted with the truth of it, again and again, until she is forced to be the adult in the relationship for the last time. Yevgenia is not a good mother but she and Lara love each other the best way they know how and there’s a special kind of tragedy when that fails to be enough. Asale Angel-Ajani writes about the relationship and each woman’s feelings so intensely that at times it’s overwhelming, and she uses the setting of the Oasis to further scrutinize their lives and lay their thoughts, feelings, and actions bare.
I’m not sure what else to say—it’s a beautiful and sad (but somehow still hopeful) story, full of melancholy and hard truths. It’s a story I’ll remember for a long time.
Please know that this book contains detailed descriptions of CSA, drug/alcohol abuse, and assault.
This is a book about generational trauma, living at the borders of the world, and growing from girlhood to womanhood.
I devoured this in a handful of days, becoming immersed in Lara and her mother Yevgenia’s relationship. Lara knows all along the kind of person that her mother is, but it broke my heart to watch her be confronted with the truth of it, again and again, until she is forced to be the adult in the relationship for the last time. Yevgenia is not a good mother but she and Lara love each other the best way they know how and there’s a special kind of tragedy when that fails to be enough. Asale Angel-Ajani writes about the relationship and each woman’s feelings so intensely that at times it’s overwhelming, and she uses the setting of the Oasis to further scrutinize their lives and lay their thoughts, feelings, and actions bare.
I’m not sure what else to say—it’s a beautiful and sad (but somehow still hopeful) story, full of melancholy and hard truths. It’s a story I’ll remember for a long time.
Please know that this book contains detailed descriptions of CSA, drug/alcohol abuse, and assault.
March 4, 2023
DNF, no discernible plot by two thirds through. I guess it’s supposed to be character driven but I didn’t find any of the characters sympathetic or nuanced. The description of life in inland Southern California is spot on, but not enough to carry the novel.
March 13, 2024
3.5**
July 5, 2023
Maybe it's because my mother is Russian and raised Soviet that she thinks a person's class is more important than their race. Her kind of thinking is too advanced for life in the U.S. I've known now for a while, that Yevgenia's faulty racial neutrality straightjackets me.
Sixteen-year-old Lara and her mother Yevgenia live an itinerant lifestyle, and after finding themselves homeless once again, they end up at Oasis Mobile Estates -- a trailer park in the California desert that feels like anything but an oasis. Lara and her mother couldn't be more different. While Yevgenia, a Russian immigrant, is an eccentric and fiery free spirit, her daughter Lara is more reserved, more grown-up out of necessity, and craves stability in her life. Lara has long since given up on Yevgenia's parenting abilities -- which mostly consist of forcing her daughter to read Russian literature and writing drunken missives about men, sex, and relationships in a series of spiral-bound notebooks -- and longs to know more about her father, a Black Cuban immigrant with mental health issues who has never been part of her life.
Just as Lara begins to settle in to her new life at the Oasis, a brutal attack brings her and Yevgenia to a crossroads, where they are forced to examine the bonds of their relationship and forge a way forward -- either together or separately.
A Country You Can Leave is a luminous coming-of-age story about a young biracial woman trying to find her place in the world and a thought-provoking exploration of racism, poverty, and identity. At the heart of the novel is Lara and Yevgenia's complicated, dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship, rife with blistering resentments, frustrations, and misunderstandings, in which their roles are often reversed. Through these complex and vivid female characters, Asale Angel-Ajani explores intergenerational trauma, parental neglect, marginalization, alcoholism, sexuality, the immigrant experience, and racial and cultural divides. The supporting characters are nuanced and diverse.
A Country You Can Leave is very much a character study without a strong over-arching plot to anchor it. I found it meandered a bit too much for me, although I certainly appreciated Angel-Ajani's deft, thoughtful examination of a number of important themes. 3.5 stars rounded up.
February 4, 2023
4 stars
This is a quiet but gripping novel filled with characters who are constantly teetering on the brink of destruction.
Lara, the m.c., has a challenging upbringing as the multiracial daughter of a single mother (Yevgenia) who leaves a lot to be desired as both a caretaker and a human. These two live a fleeting live that is marked by constant moving, financial insecurity, and general personal instability. Yevgenia is an openly sexual individual, which is great but not so much when readers remember that it's her young daughter who relays this information. Yevgenia's apparent selfishness results - as expected - in Lara's constant sense of danger and ungroundedness. The latter recounts a number of experiences that will be challenging for some readers to encounter. As an unsupervised girl whose mother both treats her as an adult in some areas and gives her few tools to navigate that status, Lara is victimized in more ways than one.
While Lara's story feels centered throughout the beginning of the novel, Yevgenia migrates from fascinating (if infuriating) side character right into the middle with her daughter. The joy and heartbreak come from the same place: the relationship between these two.
This is a truly intriguing debut featuring developed characters and an emotionally provocative plot. The smooth flow of this piece juxtaposes the often gritty content, and Angel-Ajani demonstrates marked skill throughout. I am looking forward to reading more from this writer already.
*Special thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this alc, which I received in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.
This is a quiet but gripping novel filled with characters who are constantly teetering on the brink of destruction.
Lara, the m.c., has a challenging upbringing as the multiracial daughter of a single mother (Yevgenia) who leaves a lot to be desired as both a caretaker and a human. These two live a fleeting live that is marked by constant moving, financial insecurity, and general personal instability. Yevgenia is an openly sexual individual, which is great but not so much when readers remember that it's her young daughter who relays this information. Yevgenia's apparent selfishness results - as expected - in Lara's constant sense of danger and ungroundedness. The latter recounts a number of experiences that will be challenging for some readers to encounter. As an unsupervised girl whose mother both treats her as an adult in some areas and gives her few tools to navigate that status, Lara is victimized in more ways than one.
While Lara's story feels centered throughout the beginning of the novel, Yevgenia migrates from fascinating (if infuriating) side character right into the middle with her daughter. The joy and heartbreak come from the same place: the relationship between these two.
This is a truly intriguing debut featuring developed characters and an emotionally provocative plot. The smooth flow of this piece juxtaposes the often gritty content, and Angel-Ajani demonstrates marked skill throughout. I am looking forward to reading more from this writer already.
*Special thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this alc, which I received in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.
January 8, 2024
This was an excellent read, about the difficult relationship between a Black, biracial teenage girl and her white Russian immigrant, alcoholic, and often neglectful mother. Having found themselves homeless (again), they move to a down-trodden trailer park ironically named Oasis Mobile Estates. They get to know their neighbours, none of whom have an easy life, either. This novel is very well-written (I highlighted SO many passages!!), engaging and realistic, while exploring themes of race, poverty, abuse, addiction and trauma. I thought the character development was very good as well. I honestly wanted to start reading again as soon as I finished, which never happens. I'm very much looking forward to reading more from this author!
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