How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water – Angie Cruz
Expectation: A depressing exploration of life for an underemployed immigrant during the Great Recession.
Reality: Buoyed by the charm of the main character and a fantastic audiobook performance by Rossmery Almonte, this was far more entertaining than anticipated.
My Take:
There are few authors that can deliver a fully formed character within the initial pages of a book. When it happens — like in the case of Barbara Kingsolver’s “Demon Copperhead” — it can elevate an uneven or bloated story.
What Angie Cruz’s slice-of-life novella lacks in page count, it makes up for in charm with the singularly dynamic main character, Cara Romero. This book was recommended to me as “your auntie telling you a story,” and it’s the perfect description.
Cruz presented Cara as a perpetual optimist who recognizes her own shortcomings, which made it easy to root for her as the plot vacillates between light-hearted and heavier moments. Cara isn’t given sainthood, but she earns our compassion.
After being laid off months prior, she must attend job coaching to keep her unemployment benefits. Each meeting with the career counselor turns into a quasi-therapy session, where Cara recounts various moments of her life — from fleeing to New York to escape an abusive husband in the Dominican Republic, to her estranged son, romantic entanglements and health scares.
Throughout, her unique voice shines through, and her story offers a perspective on gentrification, immigration and the promises of a “land of opportunity” that lacked the bombast and exaggeration that has become de rigueur for these plot points as of late.
Given the stream of consciousness narrative approach, there are many holes in the plot and several unresolved questions, but that’s a small criticism for a story that delivered so much heart and humor.
Still, it’s a book that probably wouldn’t have resonated with me as much had I read it.
The audiobook, which paired top-tier production with phenomenal performances by Kimberly W. Wetherell and Rossmery Almonte, is what made this one of my dark horse favorites of 2023.
Almonte gave one of the best audiobook performances I’ve ever heard. Her representation of Cara was so natural that you could easily mistake it as her reading a personal memoir. It was the perfect complement to Cruz’s text, with her cadence always matching what was presented on the page.
Frequently I found myself smiling as Almonte brought to life one of Cara’s tangents or experiences trying to navigate a digital world with an analog heart. This would make a fantastic one-person show, but I don’t think anyone except Almonte could do Cara justice.
Rating (story): 4/5 stars
Rating (narration): 5/5 stars
Format: Audiobook (library loan)
Dates read: April 23 – April 25, 2023
Multi-tasking: Good to go. The story is relatively easy to follow, but if you aren’t paying close attention, you’ll miss some of the big reveals in Cara’s story.
