The Dirty Girls Social Club

So, somewhere in 2003, I think, Mr. B. drops on my desk an article from the New York Times. Not a new occurence. He often gave me (and still does) articles from the Times or any other newspaper or magazine he assumes I do not read. "Here," he said, "this is what you should do."

It was an article on Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez and Latina Chick Lit. I, an English Major with a concentration in Creative Writing, said that of course I knew who she was, and there was no way you could compare my poetry with that. Mr. B. just shrugged and said, "she's making a whole lot of money." And that was that. I thought of the book, but never picked it up.

Well, I finally picked it up this weekend and yes, it is as quick and easy a read as one would expect. Chick Lit, romance novels, easy lit, whatever you want to call 'em - they share that fluidity, more action and plot based than anything else. This novel was all that.

And yet...

There's something to be said about representation and more importantly, about transference. Although I am not a half Cuban-half white woman raised in New Orleans, I'm not a half Dominican-half Puerto Rican woman raised in the ghetto in Boston, I'm not a Jewish Cuban raised in Miami in an abusive relationship, a Mexican-American business woman raised to call herself Spanish, nor a self identified Mexica that lives to make music and I'm not a Colombian Lesbian Newscaster, I was able to identify with each of this women. Even though some of the same characters in the novel wrestled over being "Latina" and being all grouped together because of this commonality, it was the Latinidad in each of them that I related to, and that made the novel such a joy to read.

Now, I do believe that you can enjoy and put yourself in these women shoes without being Latina - their issues are universal female issues, wether you're white, yellow, brown, black, etc. etc. We all struggled with being true to ourselves, with accepting our shortcomings and taking a positive attitude in our lives. They think like we think. Valdes-Rodriguez did a great job at giving each character their own voice and a strong difference in their personalities. So Kudos. Now, to find the sequel.