Mini review: Sabrina & Corina by Kali Fajardo-Anstine

The book selected for November for the meeting at Paper Boat Booksellers is Sabrina & Corina by Kali Fajardo-Anstine. The theme for the meeting at this location is feminism in France and the United States. Books selected for this theme can vary from just focusing on feminism in that particular country or an author who has a relationship with both of them. I choose this book because it is a collection of short stories about Mexican women in the Southwest region of the United States. Fajardo-Anstine wrote these stories as a love story to all her sisters that live in the Southwest and to call attention to their experiences. The stories deal with varied themes from addiction recovery, domestic violence, prostitution, and missing women of color. The featured story Sabrina& Corina is about the relationship between two cousins. They were best friends as children, but as they reach there 20's, they took drastically different paths. One of them went to cosmetology school and was doing well for herself working at a makeup counter. The other cousin dropped out of high school, began working at bars, and then eventually became a prostitute.

The story ends with Corina doing the makeup for Sabrina's corpse as their grandmother wanted an open casket, so Corina needed to hide the bruising from the strangulation. I personally found some stories in the collection are written better than others, and a few of the stories do fall flat. What I did find compelling about the stories is they were written not to shock you but to show you how sensitized most of the women are to the conditions they are living in. I would only recommend a few of the stories, but I will be following this author to see the other works she produces. However, all of the members of the book club loved this book! They said it was a great choice and they enjoyed all the stories. As we went around discussing the writing they found the writing powerful and that each story gave you a glimpse into each character. So, even though I thought it fell flat in some spots, all of the members would recommend this book to a friend.

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