I was looking back on past stories that we have read for class and Junot Diaz stuck out to me. So, I googled him and one of the first things that popped up was this short story that he has posted on youtube. I believe it is him reading the story, but either way a thick Latino accent is present and makes the audible story very believable. One thing I really enjoyed about Junot's The Sun, the Moon, the Stars was his voice. "Let me confess: I love Santo Domingo. I love coming home to the guys in blazers trying to push little cups of Brugal into my hands. Love the plane landing, everybody clapping when the wheels kiss the runway. Love the fact that I'm the only n****r on board without a Cuban link or a flapjack of makeup on my face (p.18)." Junot does such a magnificent job at putting the reader into someone else's shoes and that's exactly what he does in How to Date a Brown Girl.
Junot portrays the step-by-step process of dating a brown, black, white, or 'halfie' from the perspective of a Dominican teenager living in New Jersey. In one scene Junot writes: "Get back inside. Call her house and when her father picks up ask if she's there. He'll ask: Who is this? Hang up. He sounds like a principle, or a police chief, the sorta' dude with a big neck who never has to watch his back." That last line in particular struck me as beautiful. There's so many ways to describe this man or father but the way Junot describes him with "a big neck who never has to watch his back" sets up a perfect description and feeling in my head. I have seen this person before. I have shaken this person's hand. Junot sets it up perfectly. The two stories that I wrote for class were an attempt to put the reader into someone else's shoes. Junot is definitely one of my inspirations for attempting to place the reader into a different world from their own.
here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxqB7X1v77A
Nicholas
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