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Bodega Dreams: A Novel | 
 enlarge | Author: Ernesto Quinonez
Publisher: Vintage
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy New: $5.65
You Save: $8.30 (59%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  109 reviews
Sales Rank: 98175
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1st
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.2 x 0.6
ISBN: 0375705899
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780375705892
ASIN: 0375705899
Publication Date: March 14, 2000
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
"A new and authentic voice of the urban Latino experience." --Esmeralda Santiago, author of When I Was Puerto Rican
In a stunning narrative combining the gritty rhythms of Junot Diaz with the noirgenius of Walter Mosley, Bodega Dreams announces the arrival of a writer who The Village Voice has already hailed as "a Writer on the Verge."
The word is out in Spanish Harlem: Willy Bodega is king.Need college tuition for your daughter?Start-up funds for your fruit stand?Bodega can help.He gives everyone a leg up, in exchange only for loyalty--and a steady income from the drugs he pushes.
Lyric, inspired, and darkly funny, this powerful debut novel brilliantly evokes the trial of Chino, a smart, promising young man to whom Bodega turns for a favor.Chino is drawn to Bodega's street-smart idealism, but soon finds himself over his head, navigating an underworld of switchblade tempers, turncoat morality, and murder.
Amazon.com
Growing up in Spanish Harlem, Chino knew he needed three things to survive: a solid friend (his pana), a decent nickname--not some lame thing his parents had called him, like Tito or Googie--and a reputation that he would rather lose a tooth or get his ribs broken than back out of a fight. With the help of Sapo, "the meanest and ugliest kid on the block," Chino manages to make it as far as college before his life is endangered. He even attracts the attention of Nancy Saldivia, a beautiful Pentecostal girl so genuinely devout that she has earned the high school nickname "Blanca." In a typically vivid passage at the start of his debut novel, Bodega Dreams, Ernesto Quinonez writes: Blanca wasn't allowed to wear jeans but she made up for it by wearing tight, short skirts. She always carried a Bible with her and never talked bad about anybody and at school she only hung around with her Pentecostal friend, Lucy. Lucy was a hairy girl who never shaved her legs because it was against her religion. Blanca had hairy legs as well, but Lucy's legs were so hairy that everyone called her Chewbacca.... When the cruelty toward Lucy became too much for Blanca, she'd punish the boys by being the coldest, most serious person in school. Only Blanca could get away with this because she had an angelic face that almost made you want to sing Alleluia. Made you want to pick up a tambourine and join her one night in her church. Make a joyful noise to the Lord so she would begin to jump up and down to all that religious salsa. And maybe you'd be lucky enough to cop a cheap feel as the Holy Ghost took over her body. Our narrator's luck is running out, though, and when Sapo introduces him to the mysterious, powerful Willie Bodega, Chino finds himself helplessly drawn into a criminal network. Even if Chino and Sapo's world is far from your own, you can't help but succumb to Quinonez's funny, rapid-fire prose and his uncanny gift for dialect. The author's dead-on renderings of verbal tics and rhythms fit seamlessly into his depiction of the vibrant culture of East Harlem. Bodega Dreams is an unusually accomplished debut with all the right ingredients: distinctive characters, a troubling plot, and a seductive voice.--Regina Marler
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| Customer Reviews: Read 104 more reviews...
 Bodega dreams. March 30, 2007
Living in Spanish Harlem with no money is difficult. Well there's only one person you can ask for help.Willie Bodega. The outrageous novel Bodega Dreams by Ernesto Quinonez is about latin people (Puerto Ricans) living in Spanish Harlem and their experiences. It focuses on how one man trys to help the residents out in exchange for loyalty. Julio Mercado also known as Chino helps Bodega and his partner Nazario.
I loved the way Quinonez used street-smart dialogue. The way the characters talk to eachother in the book, seems like you are hearing them on the street talking in real life. He uses all the curses and slang very realistically.
I recomend this book to guys who are 16 and older because many young men are getting themselves into drugs and businesses with the wrong people. Most of them are hispanics. This book would probably have them guessing what will happen next.
Outstanding March 9, 2007
Have you ever seen the movie 'Empire' with John Leguizamo, well this is certainly somewhat like the movie. I couldn't put the book down!! I'm from the Bronx, NYC and this certainly took me back home. All he says in this book is true about growing up in 'the hood'. If you want to learn about the city and how most hispanic people grow up this is the book. What I love the most is that he is a NYC teacher, and it just inspired me more to work towards my dream of inspiring kids in the city.
The best Latino novel October 20, 2006
This is the best book with a social conscience written about Latinos. This book should've been an automatic bestseller with a powerful message about seeing the bigger picture in life and a wonderful story. The characters in this are unlike any other and the book contains many twists always making you not want to put it down.
 The Young Lords meet Jay Gatsby September 17, 2006
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I read this book for my Contempary American Literature class at SUNY Dutchess in New York.
I must admit that I was completely wrong with my assumption that Bodega Dreams was going to be about an immigrant Mexican struggling while trying to find a piece of the American dream or a family operating a small market in East LA. First of all, it doesn't even take place in LA, but in Spanish Harlem, NY. And although the main characters of the book are in fact Latino, they are Puerto-Rican. The Bodega in the title is not grocery store or an empty room, but a man.
I was almost immediately swept into the world of our beloved protagonist and narrator Chino. The first few pages of Bodega Dreams was great. The author already established his style and I fell in love with his vivid descriptions of upper Manhattan. I grew up in Yonkers, NY, in a similar environment and although I can not relate to the specific struggles of a young Latino, I could definitely understand the surroundings. I have been to East Harlem many times and the author's descriptions of El Barrio are first rate. I noticed this within the first chapters.
A few things bothered me though. I understand the importance of providing information about the past to understand who the characters are as young adults, and although the portrayal of Sapo is awesome, I would have appreciated a better development of Blanca's character and the episodes that surrounded her and Chino eventually getting married. In the beginning of the story she is described as a Pentecostal beauty that every guy wants but can't get, but then, seemingly out of the blue, she and Chino were getting married. Also, it may be different in East Harlem, but where I grew up, unless you were black, you didn't call your friends "nigga" - it just seemed funny to me - but perhaps that is the way the youth talks in Spanish Harlem and it was meant to add to the realism of the story, which is fine with me because I'll take realism and accuracy over "political-correctness" anytime and anyplace - especially in literature! But I also noticed a lot of syntax errors, like the absence of question marks and commas when they were needed. Maybe this was the fault of the editor but never-the-less it was a little annoying.
Despite little flaws like that, the Author's ability to set a mood is superb. I can picture this book becoming a movie, complete in my mind with a pre-picked cast. It has the perfect combinations of over-used cliches (which are not always a bad thing), raw dialogue, interesting characters, and a near perfect narration. I particularly liked the way Round 1 of Book 2 starts with the same few sentences as the beginning of the book, and then adds " - But by now you know that it was always about Bodega."
Quinonez is writing about a neighborhood he knows; this is obvious when I read the accuracy in all the descriptions. This makes me wonder about how much of his own experiences may have fallen into the pages of this book. How the narrator perceived his educational experiences made me a little uncomfortable though: describing the white teachers as arrogant and racist, and all the Hispanic teachers being so sympathetic to the tribulations of the latin youth.
I also wonder how much of the author's own personal opinions entered into the commentary. Upon some research, I have discovered that the author is the son of a devout Communist. Bodega's dream itself seems to be a neo-Marxist revolution, where crime, violence, and drugs are the forces behind major social rebuilding. The author even uses real examples like "the Young Lords" to reinforce the idealism of his characters and their plans to eventually "free" Puerto Rico from the American commonwealth. Although his name isn't mentioned in the book (for obvious reasons), I wonder how much of these thoughts were inspired by an admiration of Che Gueverra.
Somewhere near the middle of this book the story began to be very familiar. It was when Bodega was seeking to meet Vera that I began to feel like I was reading a modern day Spanish-Harlem version of The Great Gatsby (Gatsby and Daisy). By the end of the book my suspicions were confirmed. Bodega Dreams is, in fact, a mirror of F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic complete with a similiar twist of an ending.
It is a good novel though and a grand debut attempt. I look forward to reading more from this author.
Bodega Dreams April 27, 2006
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I read this book for an outside reading assignment in my Latin American Studies class. I don't really read a lot of books but i thought this one was ok. It started off to be a little boring. However, towards the middle it got a little bit more interesting. I personally could not relate with any of the characters and the book had a lot of stereotypes. It took place in Spanish Harlem and the three main characters are Willie, Sapo, and Chino. I think it had a good storyline and really made it an interesting read.
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