Brass

There's a strong possibility you haven't heard of Xhenet Aliu... yet. She published a little known collection four years ago, Domesticated Wild Things and Other Stories. Personally, I think it is one of the best, most well-rounded collections I've had the pleasure of reading (see my review here). Her stories were dark, yet hopeful, poetic, still simple, specific and universal—so much of what I love. So I was excited when I learned Aliu would soon publish her first novel, Brass.

Naturally, I was a little concerned if Aliu's style—so incredibly effective in short form—could be stretched out over three hundred pages. It does and it doesn't. There's a punch to Aliu's shorter stories that I looked forward to in Brass, but it never came. That's okay. Honestly, there aren't too many novels that have packed that punch, nor need to. Novels are a much more subtle form of writing and it takes an extremely dedicated and talented novelist to surprise a reader and to adequately manipulate their emotions over the length of a novel (Kazuo Ishiguro, I'm talking about you). In every other way, Brass is every bit as powerful as the stories in Aliu's collection. First and foremost, the language is simple, yet always somehow evokes higher emotions—excitement, dread, sympathy:

”... Isn't that what you want?”

I couldn't make my head move up and down in agreement, so I just rested it against his chest, listening to his heart in case it was giving anything away. It sounded like it was beating uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh, the droning pulse of a dirge, and that made me feel a little better. That dread was the same kind I felt the first time I saw Bashkim, the same kind I felt when I listened to the best minor-key ballads, and that inspired the kind of love that was easier to nurture than kudzu. It didn't even need light to grow.

Brass

Brass

Brass

Brass