Lot: Stories

Probably closer to a 4 star in actuality, but I was SO excited for this book and I have never been so convinced that I needed to read something immediately. It's a series of short stories about living in Houston and growing up black and coming out and dealing with immigration and gentrification, by a guy from Houston, and all the stories are named after suburbs and streets and neighborhoods of Houston.

This book made me so homesick for Texas, and I never even lived in Houston (the closest I lived was two hours west, in College Station, while Matt was in grad school). Kolaches and Whataburger and drinking Shiner. Harvey and Rita. The Galleria, Minute Maid Park, Rice, Katz's. But this stuff is never more than a reference; you know it or you don't, and I worry that this is going to be a turnoff for some people, that there's no further explanation. It breathes Texas. One of the reasons I loved it.

It's a somewhat dark collection. Not especially hopeful. A slice of life for most of the people in the stories, though half the stories are interconnected with the same characters and from the same point of view. Not all of these stories and these lives were familiar to me, and it was a beautiful read.