The Burning Side

Sarah Damoff's second novel, The Burning Side, opens with a house in flames. April and Leo Torres are awakened by the fire alarm, with time to grab only their two young children before fleeing to safety. Firefighters arrive, and they are able to save a portion of the house. But within the first chapter we learn that this is a story less about the partial loss of a home, and more about the fractured relationship in it. "It's easier to look at their burning house than at each other," narrates April.

The novel is told from multiple points of view: April, who grew up privileged in a nice part of Dallas; Leo, her husband, a Mexican immigrant with a fractured past who built a future for himself through sheer determination; and Deb, April's mother, who has her own hidden set of secrets. Deb insists that April, Leo, and the kids stay at their house following the fire, and with no better options, they agree. The family staggers in, shell-shocked and reeling from both the fire and their private marital turmoil. As April and Leo put up shaky masks to hide their personal issues, they're bombarded by April's seemingly perfect family: two parents still strongly in love and a home environment bustling with energy and life.

Damoff swiftly drops ever-clarifying hints, shedding light on what led to the dissolution of April and Leo's relationship, while also introducing additional information about Deb's life with her husband Billy, which has not always been as idyllic as it now appears. She taps into the internal turmoil of each narrating character. Each has their own issues to deal with, which they attempt to handle stoically and individually, despite being surrounded by loving family members. April must come to grips with her struggles to value herself; Leo must deal with trust issues and long-buried hurt caused by his parents; and Deb must contend with the secrets she's kept from her children.

Like with her debut novel The Bright Years (one of my favorite books I read this year), Damoff captures small life moments among those that are life-altering, a technique that builds an added layer of connectedness between the reader and the characters. She also once again tackles past trauma and its impact on the present. The characters' reactions and choices can frustrate a reader, but it's primarily to underscore that past unresolved issues lead to flawed decisions in the present. Where The Bright Years struck a beautiful balance between the highs and lows of life, The Burning Side is a bit more focused on the lows. This is a sad read more than it's not, but there is enough redemption and hope peppered in to offset the melancholy. We're also treated to plenty of prescient observations on life, nuggets like "love hurts so much more than indifference", and "we live in homes until we leave them, and then they live in us."

When an author delivers a stellar debut, one can't help but compare the follow-up to it. While I connected more completely with The Bright Years, much of what made that such a great book is present here as well. Those that enjoyed Damoff's debut will almost certainly like The Burning Side also; it's worth a read.