What Night Brings

Set in the Bay Area of the 1960s, this novel is narrated by Marci Cruz, an eleven-year-old Latina who fervently wishes for two things. The first is for God to turn her into a boy, because she has something of a crush on Raquel, her teenaged neighbor; the second is for Eddie, her father, to disappear. A couple of times a week, Eddie beats Marci, and Corin, her younger sister, for some infraction, usually with his leather belt. It always occurs when Delia, their mother, isn't home. Eddie always accuses the girls of lying, or says that he had to break up their fight, and Delia always believes him. During an argument, Eddie leaves the house, and doesn't return. Delia is forced to get a job at the local Woolworth's, and things settle down at home. Several months later, during which time he has been living with a woman named Wanda, Delia takes Eddie back, despite the girls' pleading with her not to do so. The beatings resume. Marci and Corin disown Eddie as their father, refusing to call him "Daddy" or "Father." With help from a neighbor, they tie him up and threaten him with a switchblade. Marci gets a book on karate from the local library, intending to learn some moves to use on Eddie. He resumes his relationship with Wanda; Delia will accept a lot of things, but she will not tolerate Eddie even looking at another woman. Marci borrows a camera from her Uncle Tommy, and sits across the street from a local bar, intending to get pictures of Eddie and Wanda together. Unintentionally, the pictures get into Delia's hands, and then comes the "final" confrontation with Eddie. This book is not just about domestic violence. Marci nearly gets thrown out of catechism class, for asking too many questions that eleven-year-olds shouldn't ask. Her teacher, Miss Beauchamp, insists on speaking with a French accent, even though she is from Wisconsin. One day, at church, she sees Uncle Tommy and Father Chacon, the parish priest, come out of the same door in the confessional. In a way, this book is not pleasant reading, but it is very good reading. The author does a fine job at "doing" a pre-teen Latina. This book could easily take place in any part of America. All in all, it's very much worth reading.

What makes Carla Trujillo's book so compelling is her portrayal of the family dynamics. Although the narrator, Marci, is only 11 years old, she makes profound observations about what holds her parents' marriage together in spite of her father's brutality and hence what prevents her mother from intervening to protect the children. Trujillo balances the horror of the father's cruelty with a lot of humor and great tenderness between the two sisters. She also reveals the roles of extended family members in the continuation of her family's troubles; some relatives attempt to shield the children, while others are unwittingly complicit in their suffering. It's a heartbreaking story overall, but Trujillo has such talent as a writer because it isn't a depressing read, and it doesn't leave you frustrated. On the contrary, the ending of the book finds the brutalized sisters empowered and on the road to recovery. If more people could read this book, perhaps this unfortunate pattern of so many women's co-dependent "love" leaving their children open to paternal abuse and permanent scars would be broken. Only by writers having the courage to explore family dynamics with the kind of honesty Trujillo does and readers openly discussing this widespread problem will things start to change within families. This is a good start & a great read.

What Night Brings is a wonderfully readable coming of age story written with the perspective of a young teen. Marci Cruz's thought process really reflects her age and circumstances, unlike some novels written in that voice with adult thoughts coming from a child protagonist. It captured my heart from the first paragraph, and I read it straight through in only a few days. Was glad to find it on the public library's new books shelf.

Winner of the Mármol Prize, Trujillo's impressive debut tells the story of Marci Cruz in the late 1960s. She prays daily to become a boy because then she can win the girl of her dreams. And she also prays for God to make her alcoholic father go away. Some of the passages seem to gloss over what Marci has to deal with, but Trujillo's strength as a storyteller compels the reader forward because we want Marci to succeed. In some ways, she is all of us, where we might not fit into the world exactly, but we're trying to find out where we belong. Bringing to mind such books as Dorothy Allison's "Bastard out of Carolina", "What Night Brings" is a heartwarming tale of a young girl at odds with her world (her family, her Church) who is on a quest for wholeness.