Growing Through the Ugly - Vazquez, Diego Jr.
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Compared to Richard Rodriguez and Sandra Cisneros, Diego Vazquez presents an audacious debut novel about seventeen-year-old Buzzy Digit and his coming of age in 1960s El Paso, Texas. Though already dead, Buzzy's memory remains alive as he narrates his tale while flying back from Vietnam in a casket. Through family crises, parties, infidelities, Little League, and days spent at mercado, we see that he longs to escape what he calls "the yellow canary cage" of Nana Kika's bustling house. The dust and solitude of El Paso oppress him, and his sexual confusion marks him as painfully different from…mehr

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Produktbeschreibung
Compared to Richard Rodriguez and Sandra Cisneros, Diego Vazquez presents an audacious debut novel about seventeen-year-old Buzzy Digit and his coming of age in 1960s El Paso, Texas. Though already dead, Buzzy's memory remains alive as he narrates his tale while flying back from Vietnam in a casket. Through family crises, parties, infidelities, Little League, and days spent at mercado, we see that he longs to escape what he calls "the yellow canary cage" of Nana Kika's bustling house. The dust and solitude of El Paso oppress him, and his sexual confusion marks him as painfully different from his friends. He drops out of high school just as the government has started a draft lottery for Vietnam, and the first numbers picked are Buzzy's.
Growing Through the Ugly begins: "This is my first day of being dead but I want to return to my abuelita's house." Even though the protagonist, Buzzy Digit, a child-turned-soldier, is dead, his memory is still alive. In lyrical, colorful, and haunting prose, drawing on elements of magic realism, we are transported to the 1960s town of El Paso, Texas, where we relive Buzzy's memories of his life with his extended family on the border between Mexico and America. The border where people speak two languages. Abandoned first by his father, then by his mother, and growing up in an erotically charged household filled with cousins, aunts, and uncles, Buzzy's world is defined by loss, loneliness, and sexual confusion. Eventually Buzzy falls in love with his destructive cousin Red, and finds that his only escape from the claustrophobia of home is what might make him a hero-or kill him: the war in Vietnam.
Autorenporträt
Diego Vazquez, Jr. teaches in the Compass Writers and Artists in the Schools and the Minnesota State Arts Board, Artists in Education programs. His work has been anthologized in Speaking in Tongues, A View from the Loft, Instant Coffee, and New Chicana/Chicano Writing. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.