Sep 23

Sep 23 If I Survive You

Author: Jonathan Escoffery
Publisher: MCD
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

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Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

A major debut, blazing with style and heart, that follows a Jamaican family striving for more in Miami, and introduces a generational storyteller.

In the 1970s, Topper and Sanya flee to Miami as political violence consumes their native Kingston. But America, as the couple and their two children learn, is far from the promised land. Excluded from society as Black immigrants, the family pushes on through Hurricane Andrew and later the 2008 recession, living in a house so cursed that the pet fish launches itself out of its own tank rather than stay. But even as things fall apart, the family remains motivated, often to its own detriment, by what their younger son, Trelawny, calls "the exquisite, racking compulsion to survive."

Masterfully constructed with heart and humor, the linked stories in Jonathan Escoffery's If I Survive You center on Trelawny as he struggles to carve out a place for himself amid financial disaster, racism, and flat-out bad luck. After a fight with Topper--himself reckoning with his failures as a parent and his longing for Jamaica--Trelawny claws his way out of homelessness through a series of odd, often hilarious jobs. Meanwhile, his brother, Delano, attempts a disastrous cash grab to get his kids back, and his cousin, Cukie, looks for a father who doesn't want to be found. As each character searches for a foothold, they never forget the profound danger of climbing without a safety net.

Pulsing with vibrant lyricism and inimitable style, sly commentary and contagious laughter, Escoffery's debut unravels what it means to be in between homes and cultures in a world at the mercy of capitalism and whiteness. With If I Survive You, Escoffery announces himself as a prodigious storyteller in a class of his own, a chronicler of American life at its most gruesome and hopeful.

TL;DR Review

If I Survive You is a strong, compelling collection of connected stories about a family of Jamaican men living in Miami. I enjoyed it quite a lot.

For you if: You like very connected short stories that could almost be called a novel.

Full Review

If I Survive You is a buzzy debut story collection that got longlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction. I’m writing this before the finalists are announced, but I gotta say, it feels like a strong contender.

This set of linked stories gives us a glimpse into the lives of the men of one Jamaican family living in Miami, particularly the younger son, Trelawny. He’s the protagonist of most of the stories, although we also get to hear from his father, his brother, and even a cousin. Trelawny is the only one who was born in the US and struggles with feeling like an outsider in every aspect of his life, including his family; the opening story, “In Flux,” sets this stage perfectly.

I do love linked stories, and these are very linked. In fact, seeing as they got away with calling How High We Go in the Dark and Disappearing Earth novels, I think this one could have snuck over that border, too. We get the stories near-linearly, following Trelawny and his family from his childhood, through Hurricane Andrew, into the Great Recession, and beyond. We come to know them, feel for them, understand their shortcomings, and hope for their futures. (In fact, the amount of time we spend with the same few characters could also give those who feel like they “always want more” from short stories the satisfaction they’re looking for.)

This is such a strong debut collection; it’s deeply heartfelt and compelling, looking at all the in-between places of race and heritage and belonging and family and survival. It’s a love letter to Jamaican families and immigrants living in Miami, and it speaks to our current moment and the last few decades alike.