Diana Sperrazza

Laura DiStefano receives a scholarship to attend the University of Mass in Battleboro a long way from Springfield, MA. It's her chance to get out of her somewhat blue collar surroundings. But she finds herself flunking out and returning back home. To say her family is dysfunctional is an understatement.

When she comes back to home she is in for a big surprise. Her younger sister is pregnant, she finds this out by accident before her parents does. Her sister had suffered a brutal attack when she was very young and just kind of checked out of life in a way. She doesn't hold herself responsible for anything and relies heavily on Laura. She feeds on Laura's guilt even though it had nothing to do with Laura.

Laura's scholarship get's reinstated but she decides she needs to stay at home. She is doing a lot of drugs and working at a luncheonette. It's about the only thing that is keeping her sane.

I really liked Ms. Sperrazza's style of writing. I adored her cast of gritty characters. They were so real and believable. I really like it when the writer touches on a subject that isn't mainstream, like Laura suffering from agoraphobia. It's a very real and debilitating illness. I look for forward to more of Ms. Sperrazza's novels.… (más)

My Townie Heart by Diana Sperrazza is one of my favorite novels of the year. I easily connected to the main protagonist, Laura, an Italian, working-class girl who planned to escape to college from her blue-collar town but instead flunks out and returns to her dysfunctional family. She is torn between caring for her barely functioning family, especially her sister who she alternatively adores and disdains but mostly protects and her wish to flee from the pain, the tedium and the lack of opportunity at home. It is also a moving portrayal of sexual assault and the wreckage it brings and what we do in the face of such brutality and hate. Laura does drugs, works in a luncheonette and goes back and forth between the friends that she meets in college who are all wealthier than her and her family and boyfriend back home as she fearfully tests out who she is and what she wants. I liked how Laura was strong and weak, tough and sometimes broken like all of us This is a gritty novel about, what it means to be working-class and the entitlement and prerogative of privilege but mostly it is how to be your authentic self.

Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.… (más)