Dogfight: A Love Story

Burgess's high-octane debut is a post-9/11 shout-out to the borough of Queens, with its roiling mix of cultures. The story chronicles one tense weekend in the life of Alfredo Batista, a 19-year-old Puerto Rican weed dealer trying to set up a dogfight to celebrate older brother Tariq's release from prison for holding up a catering hall. Alberto, who skipped out on the job at the last minute, worries that Tariq might wrongly suspect him of having snitched. Complicating matters is Tariq's girlfriend, Isabel, who's now Alberto's baby mama. And then there is Vladimir, a 15-year-old Ecstasy dealer Alberto rips off and whose brother turns out to be a Russian gangster. Accompanied by his Haitian best friend, Winston, Alberto spends most of the weekend dodging trouble and trying to steal a dog for the fight, but he can't avoid the bloodshed that erupts during the novel's attenuated climax. Despite sometimes lax plotting, Burgess's gritty, punchy narrative, propelled by fresh gusts of language, should remind readers of another outstanding outer borough literary debut—Richard Price's The Wanderers. (Sept.)