The Pulitzer Prize for fiction went to Junot Diaz for his first novel “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.” It took him eleven years to write, but it has exceeded expectations. Here is what Powells.com says about the novel:
Leaping back and forth between the Dominican Republic and New Jersey, pouring across pages in a “combustible mix of slang and lyricism” (quoth Booklist), Oscar Wao bridges several generations and distinct cultures with exhilarating doses of Caribbean history and old-fashioned pulse-pounding drama. Politics, corruption, romance, fantasy, faith, despair — the novel, as Díaz explains, contains multitudes. Kirkus, in a starred review, called it “a compelling, sex-fueled, 21st-century tragi-comedy with a magical twist.”
Powells.com, by the way, has a great interview with him here.
I read Diaz’s first published work “Drown” years ago; an outstanding collection of short stories dealing with Latin American immigrants struggling with integration and redefining their new American identities. I enjoyed each and every one of the ten stories it contained. A must read.
I read an excerpt of this book in The New Yorker awhile back. It was wonderful.