We’re Alone: Essays

Novelist and essayist Danticat (Everything Inside) delivers a collection of piercing reflections on her native Haiti. In “A Rainbow in the Sky,” Danticat describes the steep toll that increasingly severe hurricanes are taking on the country (after Hurricane Matthew hit in 2006, “there were reports of people having no food, water, or shelter and living in caves while eating potentially toxic plants”) and laments the reluctance of wealthy nations to accept climate refugees. Other selections compare the xenophobia faced by Haitian expats in the U.S. and Dominican Republic and contrast the Croix-des-Bouquets commune’s flourishing art scene with the Mawozo gang that operates out of the area. Danticat has a knack for cutting turns of phrase (“Family is whoever is left when everyone else is gone,” she remarks in “Writing the Self and Others,” which discusses her ambivalent feelings toward writing about her relatives). She also excels at weaving together personal narrative and history. For instance, she writes in “Children of the Sea” that “being human means having to keep beginning again,” recounting how a “Haitian exile” teacher helped her adjust to living in New York City after she moved there at age 12, and describing how Haiti has rebounded after the 2010 earthquake and the 1991 coup against its first democratically elected president. Danticat remains at the height of her considerable talents. (Sept.)