Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* Who killed Driss Guerraoui? Was it an accident, a hit-and-run in the wee hours of the morning? Or was it murder, a brutal act against the Moroccan immigrant who might pose a threat to a neighborhood business in a small Mojave-desert town? The mystery at the center of Lalami's (The Moor's Account, 2014) novel brings together an intriguing set of characters, including Driss' daughter, Nora, a struggling composer who returns home to the remnants of her family. There's Maryam, Driss' wife, who misses her native country; Iraq War veteran Jeremy, who is battling his own demons while trying to help Nora; and African American detective Coleman, who is trying to work out the mechanics of the case while facing her own domestic challenges. Now and then the story is nearly drowned out by the nine narrating voices, yet Lalami impressively conducts this chorus of flawed yet graceful human beings to mellifluous effect. "I didn't know which version of the past I could trust, which story was supported by the facts and which had been reshaped to fit them, whether out of grief or out of malice," Coleman worries. An eloquent reminder that frame of reference is everything when defining the "other." Copyright 2019 Booklist Reviews.
BookPage Reviews
The Other Americans
When Driss Guerraoui, the owner of a diner near Joshua Tree National Park, leaves his restaurant one night, he's killed in a mysterious hit-and-run while crossing the street. But this wasn't an accident; it was murder, concludes his daughter Nora, as a variety of surprising details about her father's life emerge. He was, after all, feuding with Anderson Baker, the owner of the bowling alley next door.
As aspiring composer Nora returns to her hometown to help run the family diner and grieve with her mother and sister, she encounters a variety of ghosts from her childhood, including Baker's son, A.J., who in high school wrote "raghead" on her locker, bullying her because her parents emigrated from Morocco out of fear of political unrest.
Moroccan-born Lila Lalami was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for The Moor's Account, and her much-anticipated fourth book, The Other Americans, doesn't disappoint. The story carefully unfolds from multiple viewpoints, including that of Nora's immigrant mother, Maryam; her jealous and seemingly highly successful sister, Salma; and even her dead father. There's also Detective Coleman, an African-American woman investigating the case, as well as a Mexican immigrant who witnessed Driss' death and remains haunted by his ghost but is afraid to come forward and risk deportation. Nora also reconnects with her high school friend Jeremy, now an Iraq War veteran and sheriff's deputy.
Lalami's crisp, straightforward prose offers the perfect counterpoint to the complexity of her plot, which artfully interweaves past and present. Reminiscent of Ann Patchett's Commonwealth in its depiction of the enduring effects of family secrets and betrayals, The Other Americans also addresses a multitude of other issues—immigration, prejudice, post--traumatic stress, love and murder—with what can only be described as magical finesse.
Copyright 2019 BookPage Reviews.Kirkus Reviews
A hit-and-run in the Mojave Desert dismantles a family and puts a structurally elegant mystery in motion. In her fourth book, Lalami is in thrilling command of her narrative gifts, reminding readers why The Moor's Account (2014) was a Pulitzer finalist. Here, she begins in the voice of Nora Guerraoui, a nascent jazz composer, who recalls: "My father was killed on a spring night four years ago, while I sat in the corner booth of a new bistro in Oakland." She was drinking champagne at the time. Nora's old middle school band mate, Jeremy Gorecki, an Iraq War veteran beset with insomnia, narrates the next chapter. He hears about the hit-and-run as he reports to work as a deputy sheriff. The third chapter shifts to Efraín Aceves, an undocumented laborer who stops in the dark to adjust his bicycle chain and witnesses the lethal impact. Naturally, he wants no entanglement with law enforcement. With each chapter, the story baton passes seamlessly to a new or returning narrator. Readers hear from Erica Coleman, a police detective with a complacent husband and troubled son; Anderson Baker, a bowling-alley proprietor irritated over shared parking with the Guerraoui's diner; the widowed Maryam Guerraoui; and even the deceased Driss Guerraoui. Nora's parents fled political upheaval in Casablanca in 1981, roughly a decade before Lalami left Morocco herself. In the U.S., Maryam says, "Above all, I was surprised by the talk shows, the way Americans loved to confess on television." The author, who holds a doctorate in linguistics, is precise with language. She notices the subtle ways that words on a diner menu become dated, a match to the décor: "The plates were gray. The water glasses were scratched. The gumball machine was empty." Nuanced characters drive this novel, and each voice gets its variation: Efraín sarcastic, Nora often argumentative, Salma, the good Guerraoui daughter, speaks with the coiled fury of the duty-bound: "You're never late, never sick, never rude." The ending is a bit pat, but Lalami expertly mines an American penchant for rendering the "other." A crime slowly unmasks a small town's worth of resentment and yearning. Copyright Kirkus 2019 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.
Library Journal Reviews
After Moroccan immigrant Driss Guerraoui is killed in a hit-and-run in California, a host of characters converge to reveal his family's secrets and the town's failings with perhaps redemptive results. Among them are his widow, Maryam, still longing for the old country; his jazz composer daughter Nora; undocumented witness Efraín, fearing deportation if he testifies; the detective, dealing with her own troubled son; and more. From Pulitzer Prize finalist and Man Booker Prize long-listed Lalami (
LJ Express Reviews
Set in a small town on the outskirts of the Joshua Tree National Monument and the Mojave Desert, this work commences when Moroccan-born restaurant owner Driss Guerraoui is the victim of a hit and run. Though structured like a murder mystery, the novel delves into much deeper themes: the process of grieving, the immigrant's life in the United States, the need to navigate parental and familial expectations, sibling rivalry, infidelity, and the impact of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) on returning veterans. Pulitzer Prize finalist Lalami (The Moor's Account) enlists an ensemble of narrators to unravel this mystery, with core voices including members of the Guerraoui family—widow Maryam, daughter Nora, and even Driss himself. When Nora reconnects with Jeremy, a former high school classmate and Iraqi War veteran, their romance adds another dimension. VERDICT A thoughtful narrative on the multitude of divisions plaguing contemporary American society, though the romance between Nora and Jeremy eventually distracts. [See Prepub Alert, 9/24/18.]—Faye A. Chadwell, Oregon State Univ. Libs., Corvallis (c) Copyright 2019. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publishers Weekly Reviews
Lalami's powerful third novel, after 2014's Pulitzer Prize finalist