Rating: 
Summary: Too Many point of views - Not enough Story
Review: As a woman of Latin decent I always flock to the new crop of emerging Latino writers and their stories, thankful that we're still being represented and hopeful that the story will resonate in the American culture. When I saw Angie Cruz's novel "Soledad" I was no different, I picked it up right away, and I must say, I was disappointed.The story begins with Soledad, whom, after running away from her Washington Heights roots to college and into a new "improved" life must return home to help her ailing mother out of an emotional coma. Within the first chapter I am swept into her Aunt Gorda's (first person) point of view, this at first was confusing, because I figured it to be Soledad's when instead it is wasn't. And that's where it began to go downhill for me. The switching back and forth between all the different characters seemed unorganized and got annoying in Cruz's writing. It seemed as if she had all these colorful characters bustling with enough energy to hold their own, and instead just threw them all in the novel resulting in a disaster. In fact, the least interesting and most underdeveloped character was the protagonist, Soledad, herself. Even her little cousin Flaca was a much more exciting, honest and well-rounded character than Soledad. I agree with the other reviewer who said he was waiting for much more to happen within the middle of the book. I too was searching and anticipating more action, excitement, PLOT. One good thing I will say about Angie Cruz's writing is she definitely has the feel of the Dominican neighborhoods, family and culture down packed. She is very keen on transporting you into that wonderfully, chaotic, beautiful, flavor filled world. She'd be a good poet. However, poets aren't always good novelists.
Ms. Cruz needs to tighten up her characters, the plots, and the direction of her stories. especially if she wants to continue writing novels. I personally feel that with the strong characters presented in the book they could have been used to create their own short story. Instead, it seems Cruz got excited and with her characters, over invited them to a party without enough food to feed, that "food" being the story.
Rating: 
Summary: Latina's determination
Review: At first I was attracted to this book for it's cover, but then i read it's tittle "Soledad" which means loneliness, and i thought maybe this book will keep me conected to my roots, and it did.
The story about a girl that wants a different future than everybody else, she wants to separate herself from what she has known all her life, to explore new paths that may take her far away.
Once she takes a new path she is forced to come back to take care of her mom who has checked out of the world. Soledad finds herself back in a place she longed to leave, she finds people she wanted to forget, but they all have something different to show her. Back in the old neighborhood she finds love where least expected, and at the end she realizes that everything she was looking for was always right in front of her. I recomend this book to people who want to learn about a part of Latin cultures in the US.
Rating:
Summary: Latina's determination
Review: At first I was attracted to this book for it's cover, but then i read it's tittle "Soledad" which means loneliness, and i thought maybe this book will keep me conected to my roots, and it did.
The story about a girl that wants a different future than everybody else, she wants to separate herself from what she has known all her life, to explore new paths that may take her far away.
Once she takes a new path she is forced to come back to take care of her mom who has checked out of the world. Soledad finds herself back in a place she longed to leave, she finds people she wanted to forget, but they all have something different to show her. Back in the old neighborhood she finds love where least expected, and at the end she realizes that everything she was looking for was always right in front of her. I recomend this book to people who want to learn about a part of Latin cultures in the US.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting, but a total mess
Review: Hello, I agree with other reviews that although this dominican-american writter smart as she is could write something more appealing with more plot. I mean you start to read the book and you feel like you just want to finish it, there is not action whatsoever, it is safe to assume this at least in most parts of the story.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful
Review: I have just finished reading this book. This book offers some insight. I also felt for the characters in the novel. However, it can be confusing if you have different people narrating. But I caught on. Again. It is a good read.
Rating:
Summary: Exuberant Debut
Review: I thoroughly disagree with those reviewers of Angie Cruz's debut novel who perhaps smugly dismiss her work as being "a total mess," or "not enough story." One reviewer boldly proclaimed that Cruz "is no Gabriel Garcia Marquez." Well, really now!! Even to suggest that an initiate in the daunting art of this lofty genre must somehow (miraculously) immediately measure up to the accomplished mastery of a seasoned novelist of the rank and distinction of the Nobel Prize-winning Colombian writer Garcia Marquez or perhaps of the caliber of Chilean Isabel Allende is unreasonable at best. After all, these two writers par excellence eventually mastered their respective literary craft only after long years of painstakingly honing a (self-satisfying) writing style and ultimate artistry. Even skilled writers don't exactly tumble out of the womb being able to compose beautiful prose or poetry. So, Angie Cruz joins the growing cadre of young, gifted writers such as Nelly Rosario and Loida Maritza Perez and others who, in time, will indeed garner the accolades and wider readership that Danticat, Alvarez, Conde, Junot Diaz, Esmeralda Santiago, and yes, Allende currently enjoy. Just give her time. Angie Cruz unquestionably knows the heart and soul of Washington Heights in upper Manhattan, home to thousands of dominicanos. She feels vividly the pulse and pace of these streets and the people there. Soledad's traumatic journey (an escape, actually) to downtown is memorable and quite believable. This is a provocative story, told with imaginative grace and power. All the characters are beautifully realized. Any suggestion of "a disorganized plot" is artistically and cleverly interwoven into the realistic, yet disorganized lives of the people who struggle to survive the harshness and ugliness of those mean streets. Y es facil, Ms Cruz?
Highly Recommended Reading! Alan Cambeira
Author of AZUCAR! The Story of Sugar (a novel)
Rating:
Summary: Exuberant Debut
Review: I thoroughly disagree with those reviewers of Angie Cruz's debut novel who perhaps smugly dismiss her work as being "a total mess," or "not enough story." One reviewer boldly proclaimed that Cruz "is no Gabriel Garcia Marquez." Well, really now!! Even to suggest that an initiate in the daunting art of this lofty genre must somehow (miraculously) immediately measure up to the accomplished mastery of a seasoned novelist of the rank and distinction of the Nobel Prize-winning Colombian writer Garcia Marquez or perhaps of the caliber of Chilean Isabel Allende is unreasonable at best. After all, these two writers par excellence eventually mastered their respective literary craft only after long years of painstakingly honing a (self-satisfying) writing style and ultimate artistry. Even skilled writers don't exactly tumble out of the womb being able to compose beautiful prose or poetry. So, Angie Cruz joins the growing cadre of young, gifted writers such as Nelly Rosario and Loida Maritza Perez and others who, in time, will indeed garner the accolades and wider readership that Danticat, Alvarez, Conde, Junot Diaz, Esmeralda Santiago, and yes, Allende currently enjoy. Just give her time. Angie Cruz unquestionably knows the heart and soul of Washington Heights in upper Manhattan, home to thousands of dominicanos. She feels vividly the pulse and pace of these streets and the people there. Soledad's traumatic journey (an escape, actually) to downtown is memorable and quite believable. This is a provocative story, told with imaginative grace and power. All the characters are beautifully realized. Any suggestion of "a disorganized plot" is artistically and cleverly interwoven into the realistic, yet disorganized lives of the people who struggle to survive the harshness and ugliness of those mean streets. Y es facil, Ms Cruz?
Highly Recommended Reading! Alan Cambeira
Author of AZUCAR! The Story of Sugar (a novel)
Rating:
Summary: Had a great time reading this book
Review: Loved this book! Loved the passion and the loyalty in which the family and neighbors have for each other. Also,the beautiful struggle to live and to love, fight and to dream. Soledad's journey is a great read. I laughed and cried, got a little wiser from the advice of the
viejo's(the old ones). This book would not have been the same without the spanglish. I will miss these people, they were my crazy familia for a few enjoyable hours. Thank you Angie Cruz...can't wait to read your next novel. I highly recommend this book to latina's everywhere.
Rating:
Summary: soledad
Review: New Novel Reviewed: Soledad, by Angie Cruz In her first novel Soledad, Angie Cruz shows that she can write good prose. Her style is evocative, simple, and clear, presenting an interesting world of spirit and intrigue packed with rich descriptions of upper New York City life. Although the title features the protagonist's name, the most brilliant and successful aspect of the novel is Cruz's creation of the teenage character Flaca. Effectively conveying the terror and beauty of adolescence, she is interesting, believable, and her scenes are full of internal and external conflict. Soledad captures a glimpse of the adolescent spirit similar to JD Salinger's classic The Catcher in the Rye, but within a Latino environment. Like Holden Caulfield, Soledad, a New York youth (but already 20 years old), suffers inner turmoil by much of what she sees. At the opening of the novel, Soledad returns to the home that she had once desperately fled. Her troubled past comes alive in the Washington Heights ghetto of New York City, where, in facing her family and friends, she confronts old and new parts of herself, eventually to the point of reexamining former assumptions. As she approaches her old block, she endures an attack within her own neighborhood, but not by any real physical forces of aggression; she is attacked by the memory of all things connected to home: "As soon as I arrive at 164th Street I'm attacked. I trip on the uneven sidewalk. The air-conditioners spit at me. The smell of onion and cilantro sting my eyes. I start to sneeze, the humidity is thick...Hydrants erupt...I know I should turn back while I still can...There are more cops on the street than fire hydrants. Merengue blares...sneakers hang from lamp posts...my time in Washington Heights is like a prison sentence." [P13] Throughout the story, Cruz writes insightful characters and vivid descriptions that leap from every page; yet, she fails to present it within a tight dramatic framework necessary for any work of fiction. Halfway through the book, I was still waiting for too much to happen. Beneath so many well-written phrases, I wondered about purpose, expecting a more distinct build up of action. Still, I offer Soledad as a good first novel. Based on its exciting themes - images of beauty and race, duty and marriage, implications of self-love and self-loathing, mysticism, education, family, and freedom --Soledad will effectively stir up provocative sociological and psychological discussions in and out of the classroom.
Rating: 
Summary: New Novel Reviewed: SOLEDAD, by Angie Cruz
Review: New Novel Reviewed: Soledad, by Angie Cruz In her first novel Soledad, Angie Cruz shows that she can write good prose. Her style is evocative, simple, and clear, presenting an interesting world of spirit and intrigue packed with rich descriptions of upper New York City life. Although the title features the protagonist's name, the most brilliant and successful aspect of the novel is Cruz's creation of the teenage character Flaca. Effectively conveying the terror and beauty of adolescence, she is interesting, believable, and her scenes are full of internal and external conflict. Soledad captures a glimpse of the adolescent spirit similar to JD Salinger's classic The Catcher in the Rye, but within a Latino environment. Like Holden Caulfield, Soledad, a New York youth (but already 20 years old), suffers inner turmoil by much of what she sees. At the opening of the novel, Soledad returns to the home that she had once desperately fled. Her troubled past comes alive in the Washington Heights ghetto of New York City, where, in facing her family and friends, she confronts old and new parts of herself, eventually to the point of reexamining former assumptions. As she approaches her old block, she endures an attack within her own neighborhood, but not by any real physical forces of aggression; she is attacked by the memory of all things connected to home: "As soon as I arrive at 164th Street I'm attacked. I trip on the uneven sidewalk. The air-conditioners spit at me. The smell of onion and cilantro sting my eyes. I start to sneeze, the humidity is thick...Hydrants erupt...I know I should turn back while I still can...There are more cops on the street than fire hydrants. Merengue blares...sneakers hang from lamp posts...my time in Washington Heights is like a prison sentence." [P13] Throughout the story, Cruz writes insightful characters and vivid descriptions that leap from every page; yet, she fails to present it within a tight dramatic framework necessary for any work of fiction. Halfway through the book, I was still waiting for too much to happen. Beneath so many well-written phrases, I wondered about purpose, expecting a more distinct build up of action. Still, I offer Soledad as a good first novel. Based on its exciting themes - images of beauty and race, duty and marriage, implications of self-love and self-loathing, mysticism, education, family, and freedom --Soledad will effectively stir up provocative sociological and psychological discussions in and out of the classroom.
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