Writers At The Wrecking Bar | Brass by Xhenet Aliu

Writers At The Wrecking Bar | Brass by Xhenet Aliu

Tuesday, Jan 23, 2018 7:00 PM

Location:
Wrecking Bar Brewpub
292 Moreland Ave, Atlanta, GA 30309

A Cappella Books presents Writers @ The Wrecking Bar, a monthly fiction series at our neighborhood brewpub, The Wrecking Bar

Join us and mingle with other fans of contemporary fiction each month, check out the Wrecking Bar's own unique beer selection, wine and specially crafted cocktails, enjoy complimentary snacks, and meet and engage with some of today's most celebrated novelists and short story writers. 

Each program includes authors in conversation with local book critics, audience Q&A, and a book signing. The bar opens at 7PM, with the author conversation starting at 7:30PM.


ABOUT THIS MONTH'S EVENT
On Tuesday, January 23 at 7PM, this month's featured author Xhenet Aliu discusses her debut novel Brass with Atlanta writer Reetika Nijhawan. A book signing will follow.
 
This event is free and open to the public.


If you are unable to attend this event, you may still pre-order a signed copy below.


ABOUT THE BOOK
A fierce debut novel about mothers and daughters, haves and have-nots, and the stark realities behind the American Dream
 
A waitress at the Betsy Ross Diner, Elsie hopes her nickel-and-dime tips will add up to a new life. Then she meets Bashkim, who is at once both worldly and naïve, a married man who left Albania to chase his dreams—and wound up working as a line cook in Waterbury, Connecticut. Back when the brass mills were still open, this bustling factory town drew one wave of immigrants after another. Now it’s the place they can’t seem to leave. Elsie, herself the granddaughter of Lithuanian immigrants, falls in love quickly, but when she learns that she’s pregnant, Elsie can’t help wondering where Bashkim’s heart really lies, and what he’ll do about the wife he left behind.
 
Seventeen years later, headstrong and independent Luljeta receives a rejection letter from NYU and her first-ever suspension from school on the same day. Instead of striking out on her own in Manhattan, she’s stuck in Connecticut with her mother, Elsie—a fate she refuses to accept. Wondering if the key to her future is unlocking the secrets of the past, Lulu decides to find out what exactly her mother has been hiding about the father she never knew. As she soon discovers, the truth is closer than she ever imagined.
 
Told in equally gripping parallel narratives with biting wit and grace, Brass announces a fearless new voice with a timely, tender, and quintessentially American story.
 
Advance praise for Brass
 
“With all-the-way-live characters, vigorous observation, combative dialogue, bravado metaphors, and ninja parsing of social class, immigrant struggles, bad behavior, and stubborn hope, Aliu has created a boldly witty and astute inquiry into the nature-versus-nurture debate, the inheritance of pain, and the dream of transcendence.”Booklist (starred review)

“The unforgettable mother and daughter at the center of Brass are as bright and tough as the metal itself, and Xhenet Aliu depicts their parallel journeys with equal parts grit and tenderness. Brass is a fierce, big-hearted, unflinching debut.”—Celeste Ng, author of Everything I Never Told You
 
“Xhenet Aliu is ferociously talented. She’s written a story so scathingly honest with characters so perfectly real, it left me breathless with admiration. There is no false sentiment here, no misplaced word, just a novel that pulses with a restless energy, a novel that pulses with life.”—Cristina Henríquez, author of The Book of Unknown Americans