PHOTOGRAPHY: Maddy Watson
Digging up American Dirt By Rachel Chopping
If you’re up to date with your literary scandals you’ve probably already heard of the American Dirt outrage that erupted earlier this year. In January, American Dirt was published by Flatiron books, an imprint of Macmillan. Reviews garnered from Stephen King, John Grisham, The New York Times, and Oprah herself were rolled out alongside a wildly expensive marketing campaign. The US publisher and its global counterparts propped it up as ‘the most anticipated book of 2020’ and scored it as Oprah’s selection for her monthly Book Club. Written by Jeanine Cummins, an author whose own racial identity has come under much scrutiny, American Dirt follows Lydia Quixano Pérez, a bookseller forced to flee Mexico as an undocumented immigrant after her family is murdered in an act of gang violence. Fearing herself and her son, Luca, will be next, the two embark on an arduous journey to the US border, encountering a variety of other migrants with their own stories to tell along the way.
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