I adored Mesha Maren’s debut SUGAR RUN a few years ago so I was eager to see what her follow-up PERPETUAL WEST would be like. It’s.. a lot. The writing is dense and filled to the brim, the story is simple but filled with metaphor, complex relationships, and borders both real and imaginary. The biggest hurdle I had with this book was the feeling of inaccessibility into the dense writing and complex characters. There was a lot of pain and trauma within their stories, but there wasn’t a lot of life and therefore I had trouble connecting. There is no doubt Maren is an exceptional writer, and the first part of the book showcases that. However, the middle is middling and the ending left much to be desired.

Elana and Alex are young newlyweds who relocate to El Paso from Virginia in 2005. They are academics trying to find their place in the world and running away from difficult family situations. They are best friends, but clearly not compatible as a married couple. They both have secrets and when Elana travels back home to visit family without Alex, she returns a week later to find him missing and no one aple to help. The mystery as to where Alex has gone is complex and layered, and a super interesting part of the story, but once the mystery is somewhat solved, the book becomes a bit of a slog.

This book is very well-written, including interesting characters with intriguing backgrounds. The plot itself is captivating, but I did feel as though the story dragged in certain parts. Overall, it was a good read, and I plan to pick up more books by this author.

This book juggles a lot of very relevant topics such as racism, immigration, mental illness, religion, LGBTQ+ issues, loneliness and forgiveness. It offers a lot of discussion points that we all struggle and deal with. Beautifully written!

Perpetual West is a story about borders, cultures, and the choices and events that shape a person's life. This book will keep you in your seat, turning pages.

Alex and Elena grew up in West Virginia. Elena's family had lived there for years but Alex was adopted as a baby by local residents who had gone to Mexico as missionaries. They got close in college and married, sure that each had found their soulmate. Restless, the couple came up with the plan to move to El Paso so that Alex could try to investigate his origins.
The two entered graduate programs in Texas. Alex decided to write his thesis on lucha libra, the wrestling industry that so enchanted the population. The wrestlers are idolized and are like rock stars. Alex didn't expect to fall in love with Mateo and Elena has no idea that Alex has drifted from her and their relationship.

When Elena goes home for a week for a family issue, Alex takes the opportunity to spend the week in Mexico with Mateo. But Mateo has his own issues. He is caught up in a struggle within the industry and the drug cartel wants to move in and take the contracts of the top wrestlers. Mateo and Alex are kidnapped and taken to the home of the cartel head.

When Elena returns, she begins to search for Alex. She quickly learns how little of his life she knew and she thinks of all the secrets she had been hiding from him. Did they know each other at all? Was their marriage ever anymore than a convenience to propel them out of West Virginia? As she travels through Mexico looking for him, Elena meets many people who help in their own ways but she has no success.

Mesha Maren has written one other novel, Sugar Run. In this novel, she explores the loneliness we all carry and the difficulty in breaking down the barriers and letting others know our secrets. The reader will feel the desperation and despair that Elena feels as she searches and Alex's terror as he contemplates where his secrets have brought him. This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.

Two young people looking to start fresh. Living between two borders . Alex and Elena raised by fervent religious Pentecostals move from Virginia to Texas very close to the border hopin* to enrich themselves of their culture, Mexico. Alex fully embraces the rich vast culture that awaits him over the border. An embrace 5gat is met with suspicion and danger. Alex disappears and Elana is left to navigate his lost and find answers.

This visual and visceral novel tells a story from three very different viewpoints--graduate student Alex, his wife Elana, and Mateo, a Mexican wrestler. The description of the people, the landscape, and the struggles and celebrations of their complicated relationships was beautiful and haunting. I found myself re-reading sentences and becoming fully immersed in their intersecting lives and the theme of physical and emotional borders that takes the reader on a deep, dark journey.

3.5 stars

Elana and Alex are a young married couple starting out life. Although they are the best of friends neither seems fulfilled in the home they have made for themselves. Both are wanting for more. Alex, a foundling who was adopted out of Mexico and raised by White missionaries wishes to connect with his natal land. Elana yearns for agency. For the ability to make choices for herself. To be seen and not to be left behind.

As much as this novel is dealing with political borders Maren dedicates a great part to the interior self, our identity, the boundaries that separate families and those that help us define our space in this world.

<i>"So much pain so close to home only bolstered that feeling of being chosen: the promised land, the magic line."</i>

When this thought pops into Elana's head she is only considering the sociopolitical dynamic between the United States and Mexico. She has yet to venture back home to Appalachia. Alex has yet to disappear into Mexico. As we travel with them we learn how much pain home represents for both of them. We see them struggle to come to grips with their identities. We're hoping that even if they never find their way back to each other that they fin safety in being themselves.

<b>Quotes:</b>
<i>"I was going to start living. Once I knew myself, once I knew everything. I thought I'd meet myself, walking along the street, I'd find the real me."</i>

<i>"He thought he understood Elana now. To put something inside your body was a heavy decision; to break the boundary and let something in, it could wreck you. Emptiness was safety."</i>

<i>"This place was magical. You could come from nothing, piss-poor nothing, and put on a mask and transform everything. "Here in the ring, you can dream." </i>

Thank you Algonquin books for granting me access to this book.

I was not aware this was a follow-up when I requested this book, I'll be honest. I was sucked in by the insanely gorgeous cover. However, I was still able to follow along with this gorgeous story.

This is a very complexly written and lovely book, I look forward to going back and reading Sugar Run!

Thanks to Algonquin and NetGalley for the review copy!

3.5 Stars

1,171 days ago I finished reading her debut novel, Sugar Run, which I loved, so I was excited to read this one, Perpetual West, which explores the lives of Elana, and her husband Alex, a man who was originally born in Mexico, and adopted by missionaries from West Virginia.

This story begins in 2005, when George W. Bush was then President, and when Elana, 21, and Alex make the decision to move from Virginia to El Paso, Texas, where he is a grad student studying sociology. Once settled in El Paso, and only 9 miles from Juarez, they explore the area. This is how Alex meets Mateo, a lucha libre wrestler, and an attraction begins to take shape between the two as Elana has to return to the east coast due to an urgent family matter. Mateo offers to take Alex to Creel, Mateo’s home town. Alex is only too happy to see more of the country where he was born, and absorb the culture of this place he has spent so little time in, and knows so little about.

Elana returns, only to find Alex gone, and not answering his phone with good reason. He’s been kidnapped along with Mateo. Elana is determined to find him, but it isn’t an easy task since she has little to go on, and the police tend to dismiss her concerns, all but patting her on the head while trying to convince her that he’s either just decided to leave her or has decided to take a vacation. Language is difficult as her familiarity with Spanish is minimal, which adds to her frustration for anyone to take her seriously. As time passes, she begins to struggle more with no one believing her, or being willing to listen to her concerns.

Elana and Alex’s stories are essentially separate from each other as their stories continue. Elana, desperate to find Alex, and each desperately seeking a return to some degree of normalcy. The twists and turns that have changed the path they began when they first decided to go in search of a new life have changed them along the way.

Eventually, people come along that are willing to offer help, befriend her, even though they aren’t exactly sure what to do in order to find Alex. It is the willingness to offer that help which allows her even a glimmer of hope, and gives her that essential feeling of being heard.

A story about borders, the ones we physically cross as well as the ones we create between ourselves and others through secrets - both the ones we keep from others, as well as hide from ourselves.


Pub Date: 25 Jan 2022

Many thanks for the ARC provided by Algonquin Books

Perpetual West was a book that was going fine for me, until a certain line, a throwaway line that was never brought up again, and never interrogated. Up to that point, I had, mostly, been enjoying it (more so Alex and Mateo’s stories than Elana’s, but still). On balance, I would have given this 3 stars. But the line. Specifically, it was a line about Elana having travelled to Israel to visit kibbutzim, and that her father was proud of her for it. So, we’re just going to pretend that this doesn’t totally erase the apartheid there? That this paints these characters as, at minimum, thoughtless and privileged, at worst actively Zionist? This is the point where I stopped sympathising with Elana in the slightest, and that line is the reason I ended up rating it 2 stars.

Book: Perpetual West
Author: Mesha Maren
Rating: 4 Out of 5 Stars

I would like to thank the publisher, Algonquin Books, for providing me with an ARC.

So, I’m just going to be honest, I had no idea that this was a follow-up when I picked this one up. With that being said, I felt like I did have a pretty good understanding of the story. While this may be a follow-up, I do really think you can read it as a stand alone-although, I do want to pick up Sugar Run just to see if that adds anything to the story.

I really had no idea what to expect when I went into this one. I thought it was going to be your run of the mill literally fiction, but I was wrong. We start out by following a young couple, Elana and Alex, who have moved to El Paso, Texas and spend their time crossing the Mexican border. They have came here so that Alex can discover his Mexican roots. At first, this is what the story seems like it is going to be. Just a young couple, out of their own for the first time and trying to find themselves. As the story goes on, though, you start to see the layers take shape. While this book is still a journey of self-discovery, there is more to it than that.

It happens pretty quickly too. Elana goes back to West Virginia to see her family. While she is gone, Alex slips back across the border. It is here that we start to see Alex’s second life start to come out-a life that Elana doesn’t know about. He is from Mexico, but has been adopted and raised in the US. He wants to find himself and he sees this is his chance, which Elana is all aware of. What she isn’t aware of is that Alex has fallen in love with a lucha libre fighter named Mateo. She has no idea that Mateo’s boss is also tied up with the Mexican drug cartel and that this is going to change their lives.

How? Well, Alex disappears and Elana finds herself alone. She goes into Mexico. She doesn’t have a firm grasp on Spanish nor the culture. With Elana, we get to see the American view of Mexico. We see her have to deal with the fac that she is trying to find her husband in a country that is well-known for its police corruption. We see her struggle with trying to communicate with what she is trying to do and trying to make others understand. She is isolated and doesn’t really know what to do. However, she does make friends and these friends will do everything in their power to help her. We get to see how people will come together to help someone in need and help their make it through a foreign country. We to get to see the human side of human nature.

The writing is amazing and will pull at you in all the right places. Everything is done through layers and as you get deeper into the story, you get to see just how complex and deep those layers run. It’s almost like you are in Mexico and expecting the events with the characters-that’s how good the writing is. You feel everything that happens, which is what makes me want to pick up more of this author’s works.

Anyway, I really did enjoy this title.

This book comes out on January 25, 2022.

Youtube: https://youtu.be/DVCdr3etx8M

I loved this book! The writing is so good; the story unravels seamlessly as we get to know the main characters more deeply. Maron is a fresh new voice, and I am looking forward to her next book.

The entire novel seemed like it could have been a true story. It’s so detailed and nuanced. The author has done her homework. I googled quite often to make sure I understood acronyms used and proper nouns. There were quite a few Spanish words I looked up also to make sure I was getting it. Although I am quite ignorant as to the drug wars of Mexico, I felt that the portrayal of the gangs and their power was very authentic. I learned a lot about Mexico -its politics, customs and the sense of place is palpable. I enjoyed the different political perspectives offered. I got the sense that Americans here and in Mexico are quite clueless about what’s really going on. In fact, I’m not sure if I personally “got” all that’s in this book and I may need to reread it. I enjoy learning through fiction so I probably will.

I loved how the story took place right on the border and, again, it all felt very real to me. The contrasts drawn between life in El Paso and Juarez were wonderfully portrayed; the day-to-day life of someone crossing back and forth was interesting. The concept of being between worlds is not just an issue for Alex, adopted as he was to America. It’s the universal question of where is home? Our birth place, where we grow up, or can we choose where to call home? Can an immigrant ever feel at home in either country? The concept of perpetual west as a last frontier for Americans was intriguing and rang true to me.

At the end of this book, I miss Alex, Elena and Mateo; they were that real to me. I identified most with the vulnerable Elana. Her battles with anorexia were heartbreaking and I honestly wanted to give her a hug. Surprisingly I was rooting for both Alex and Mateo also and found them to be very likeable characters even when they weren’t so nice. She is torn between countries and loyalties also, having gotten married so young and not being at all sure of her place in the world or her family. Surprisingly I was rooting for both Alex and Mateo also and found them to be very likeable characters even when they weren’t so nice. The other characters seemed a bit more one dimensional – the stereotypical mom, the tough dad. Simon, Elena’s brother, did grow but I felt like he was left in limbo. Still in Mexico?

Some of this book was hard to read; there was a sense of dread present once Mateo is located and I feared for Alex and Elena for a long time. I would like to see the next stages in their lives – sequel maybe? The ending was understated and extremely satisfying; the suffering doesn’t end completely but there is a strong note of hope and resilience.

Thank you to Net Galley and Algonquin for introducing me to this talented author. I shall be picking up her other book very soon.

Thank you to #netgalley and #algonquin books for the opportunity to read this ARC. This was a slow read for me because as someone living at a border with Mexico and having family in Juarez a lot of it hit too close to home. I must say I’m impressed by the authors depiction of Mexican and fronterizo culture from that instant cultural shock of going between two places so near yet so different, to the details of lucha libre, to politics and narcos. I truly appreciate how the characters, including Neto were not just good or evil, but part of a spectrum where the reader gets to delve into the most intimate part of their beings.
My experience with this book was similar to the one I had Pedro Páramo where it was a very slow start, but after reading it once I’ve just had to read it over and over and there is something new to unpack every time, I will be reading it again and suspect I’ll grow to love it more.

Final thoughts: What kept me going through the slow start were the references that I could identify with from the writing on the cerro to the mention of Juan Gabriel, I’m very curious to know the reaction to this book from someone who is not already familiar with the fronterizo culture.