A "beautifully written" (New York Times Book Review) novel of redemption by a prize-winning international literary star. From the acclaimed author of The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears comes a heartbreaking literary masterwork about love, family, and the power of imagination. Following the death of his father Yosef, Jonas Woldemariam feels compelled to make sense of the volatile generational and cultural ties that have forged him. Leaving behind his marriage and job in New York, he sets out to retrace his mother and father's honeymoon as young Ethiopian immigrants and weave together a family history that will take him from the war-torn country of his parents' youth to a brighter vision of his life in America today. In so doing, he crafts a story- real or invented-that holds the possibility of reconciliation and redemption.
The grown son of Ethiopian immigrants wrestles with ghosts of the past after his father dies in Dinaw Mengestu's second novel, HOW TO READ THE AIR. Jonas undertakes a journey along the same route his parents traveled on an interstate road trip the year he was born, then reaches back farther, all the way to their home country in Africa. The emotional and generational waves stroking throughout the story place Mengestu's tale in the long tradition of immigration epics. What Jonas uncovers about his family's history both questions and helps answer the reality of the American dream. Selected by the New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of 2010 and by Publishers Weekly as a 2010 Top 100 Book.
- Genre: Fiction + Literature Genres
- Subgenre: General, Literary
- Publisher: Riverhead Books
- Pages: 305
- Edition: Reprint
- Language: English
- Format: paperback
- Release Date: October 4, 2011
- Date Published: October 4, 2011
- Author: Dinaw Mengestu