Items related to So L.A.: a novel
Beautiful Magdalena de la Cruz breezed through Berkeley and built an empire selling designer water. She’d never felt awkward or unattractive... until she moved to Los Angeles. In L.A. where “everything smells like acetone and Errol Flynn” Magdalena attempts to reinvent herself as a geographically appropriate bombshell—with rhinestones, silicone and gin—as she seeks an escape from her unraveling marriage and the traumatic death of her younger brother, Junah. Magdalena’s Los Angeles is glitzy and glamorous but also a landscape of the absurd. Her languidly lyrical voice provides a travel guide for a city of make-believe, where even Hollywood insiders feel left out. Like a lane change on the 405 freeway during rush hour, Bridget Hoida, skillfully navigates the impossible in So L.A. offering a portrait of contemporary Los Angeles through the penetrating prose of her female protagonist. Evoking a dynamic and materialist landscape, So L.A. introduces readers to the unforgettable voice of an extremely talented new writer. “Bridget is a rare thing — an original writer with a unique voice. Her writing is ironic, satirical, smart, sexy and deeply tender. This is a book Joan Didion will wish she’d written!” — Chris Abani, author of The Virgin of Flames and Song For Night “Bridget Hoida has crafted a remarkably fine novel. The language of this work is fresh, surprising and relentless. The novel captures California, it captures the culture, it captures this one woman’s life and it captured me. This is strong stuff from a strong talent. Hoida’s voice is here to stay.” -Percival Everett, author of Assumption and Erasure “In So L.A., Bridget Hoida has crafted that rarest of books: intelligent, gorgeously written—and, best of all, fun. The charming, witty and slightly off-kilter voice of narrator Magdalena de la Cruz brings to mind the writing of Nabokov—but in a distinctly California style: Magdalena is a six-foot blonde rhinestone artist with acrylic nails and silicone breasts living in the heart of Los Angeles. She is, by turns, endearing, frustrating and heart-breaking as she tries to salvage her dissolving marriage in the wake of her brother’s death. Hoida’s sharp, exquisite prose awed me, and brought me to both laughter and tears.” -Shawna Yang Ryan, author of Water Ghosts “Both heartbreaking and hilarious, Bridget Hoida’s novel is a stunning debut. Inventive and deeply poetic, charming and wickedly witty, this is a work of lasting and profound satisfactions.” -David St. John, author of The Red Leaves of Night
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About the Author:
Bridget Hoida lives and writes in Southern California. In a past life she was a librarian, a DJ, a high school teacher and a barista. In this life she experiments with poetry and fiction and has taught writing at UC Irvine, the University of Southern California and Saddleback College. Bridget is the recipient of an Anna Bing Arnold Fellowship and the Edward Moses prize for fiction. She was a finalist in the Joseph Henry Jackson/San Francisco Intersection for the Arts Award for a first novel and the William Faulkner Pirate’s Alley first novel contest. Her short stories have appeared in the Berkeley Fiction Review, Mary, and Faultline Journal, among others, and she was a finalist in the Iowa Review Fiction Prize and the Glimmer Train New Writer’s Short Story Contest. Her poetry has been recognized as an Academy of American Poets Prize finalist and she was a Future Professoriate Scholar at USC. She has a BA from UC Berkeley and a Ph.D. in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California. So L.A. is her first novel.
Review:
A protagonist's soul is revealed only through the expertise of a skilled writer capable of capturing every thought, mood, and emotion. In So L.A., Bridget Hoida creates a poignant exploration of a grief-stricken artist's mind as she learns to accept the accidental rock-climbing death of her younger brother and the gradual demise of her marriage to a wealthy businessman. Overwhelmed by internal conflict and bombarded by external stresses, Magdalena de la Cruz soothes her insecurities with alcohol and sedatives, while chasing the impossible dream of achieving her own physical perfection. In a candid, first-person story broken into lyrical, journal- like entries, this flawed, beautiful heroine reinvents herself in order to become a part of the Beverly Hills elite, a social circle few are privileged to enter. The expected friendships, romantic interludes, and sexual liaisons all make an appearance in this glitzy novel of thwarted expectations and opportunities. Without traditional dialogue set in quotation marks, this literary endeavor has nothing in common with structured commercial fiction. Every character speaks with a distinctive voice embedded within the narrative. For example: Don't play dumb with me, Puck said, lowering his voice to a confidential whisper. You may have the rest of the Southland fooled with your designer water and celluloid veneer, he shot me a sexy little wink, but every once in a while your Valley surfaces. The easygoing style and tone of a diary make the story simple to absorb, especially as it is well written: "Maybe my mother was right. Maybe it was time to go home to the brown ranch I grew up in, because suddenly I wanted nothing more than to crawl under the green-gingham bedspread of my childhood and sleep." Magdalena may never come across as definitive or concise, but she is a lifelike personality in this subtle portrait of a tender woman's spirit in conflict with itself. Sheer will to live propels this traumatized individual to endure tremendous psychological pain under challenging circumstances. An award-winning scholar and writer, Bridget Hoida holds a doctorate in literature and creative writing from the University of Southern California. So L.A. is her debut novel. (Starred Review: Five Stars out of Five). ----- Julia Ann Charpentier, ForeWord Clarion Review
One woman juggles the five stages of grief in this novel's cutting portrait of a marriage's slow-motion deterioration. [...] Prone to embellishment, melodrama and laugh-out-loud set pieces, Magdalena isn't an unreliable narrator, even though she admits to being inconsistent. Hoida gives her a sure and steady voice, full of caustic wit and raw emotion. With bright similes and shining epigrams, she gleefully mines Tinseltown tropes while skewering class, consumerism and body image. Revelations are punctuated with punch lines that land squarely in the gut. Although the ending is abrupt, it's as clever as the rest of the book. Best of all, it leaves hope that readers haven't seen the end of Magda. In this razor-sharp debut, grief and loathing beget a juicy tragicomedy. --Kirkus Reviews
Electric, funny, lively, edged prose illuminates the pages of So L.A. -Hoida knows how to write sentences and characters that bite right into you. --Aimee Bender, author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake
Bridget is a rare thing an original writer with a unique voice. Her writing is ironic, satirical, smart, sexy and deeply tender. This is a book Joan Didion will wish she'd written! --Chris Abani, author of Graceland
Bridget Hoida has crafted a remarkably fine novel. The language of this work is fresh, surprising and relentless. The novel captures California, it captures the culture, it captures this one woman's life and it captured me. This is strong stuff from a strong talent. Hoida's voice is here to stay. --Percival Everett, author of Assumption and Erasure
In So L.A., Bridget Hoida has crafted that rarest of books: intelligent, gorgeously written and, best of all, fun. The charming, witty and slightly off-kilter voice of narrator Magdalena de la Cruz brings to mind the writing of Nabokov but in a distinctly California style: Magdalena is a six-foot blonde rhinestone artist with acrylic nails and silicone breasts living in the heart of Los Angeles. She is, by turns, endearing, frustrating and heart-breaking as she tries to salvage her dissolving marriage in the wake of her brother's death. Hoida's sharp, exquisite prose awed me, and brought me to both laughter and tears. ------Shawna Yang Ryan, author of Water Ghosts
One woman juggles the five stages of grief in this novel's cutting portrait of a marriage's slow-motion deterioration. [...] Prone to embellishment, melodrama and laugh-out-loud set pieces, Magdalena isn't an unreliable narrator, even though she admits to being inconsistent. Hoida gives her a sure and steady voice, full of caustic wit and raw emotion. With bright similes and shining epigrams, she gleefully mines Tinseltown tropes while skewering class, consumerism and body image. Revelations are punctuated with punch lines that land squarely in the gut. Although the ending is abrupt, it's as clever as the rest of the book. Best of all, it leaves hope that readers haven't seen the end of Magda. In this razor-sharp debut, grief and loathing beget a juicy tragicomedy. --Kirkus Reviews
Electric, funny, lively, edged prose illuminates the pages of So L.A. -Hoida knows how to write sentences and characters that bite right into you. --Aimee Bender, author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake
Bridget is a rare thing an original writer with a unique voice. Her writing is ironic, satirical, smart, sexy and deeply tender. This is a book Joan Didion will wish she'd written! --Chris Abani, author of Graceland
Bridget Hoida has crafted a remarkably fine novel. The language of this work is fresh, surprising and relentless. The novel captures California, it captures the culture, it captures this one woman's life and it captured me. This is strong stuff from a strong talent. Hoida's voice is here to stay. --Percival Everett, author of Assumption and Erasure
In So L.A., Bridget Hoida has crafted that rarest of books: intelligent, gorgeously written and, best of all, fun. The charming, witty and slightly off-kilter voice of narrator Magdalena de la Cruz brings to mind the writing of Nabokov but in a distinctly California style: Magdalena is a six-foot blonde rhinestone artist with acrylic nails and silicone breasts living in the heart of Los Angeles. She is, by turns, endearing, frustrating and heart-breaking as she tries to salvage her dissolving marriage in the wake of her brother's death. Hoida's sharp, exquisite prose awed me, and brought me to both laughter and tears. ------Shawna Yang Ryan, author of Water Ghosts
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherLettered Press
- Publication date2012
- ISBN 10 0985129417
- ISBN 13 9780985129415
- BindingPaperback
- Number of pages382
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