Bayou Pages | “Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez

review by Meredith McKinnie

“Weddings, she quickly discovered, were about everything except the health of a couple’s relationship. They were social performances, the purpose of which varied from family to family. And they were competitive.”

Gonzalez’s debut novel Olga Dies Dreaming opens with the title character musing about napkins, how she can tell the status and class of a couple by their attention to the napkins chosen for their wedding. The ultra-rich will not settle for simply hand stitched and modern designs. The napkins must absorb the inevitable spills to accompany a party that lasts until the early morning and is overflowing with alcoholic beverages on demand. Olga’s ruminations about the wedding industry come after years of serving the well-connected and well-to-do, accommodating their trivial preferences and unrealistic, aesthetic whims meant only to impress and one-up the rest of the 1%. Having originally seen her financial success as a manifestation of the American dream, Olga begins to question dedicating her life to unfulfilling work that advances the status quo. 

The American dream and how it is defined by immigrants are at the heart of this novel, along with American assimilation and its influence on culture. Like Olga, her brother Prieto, a longtime Congressman representing Brooklyn, is struggling with political power, advancing the causes of those who support his political campaigns and the constituents he has promised to serve. This intimate bond between these two siblings is cemented by parental absence, a mother who abandoned the children when Olga was only 12 years old and a father who succumbed to drug addiction and ultimately died of AIDS. The mother’s shadow is a consistent presence, aided by her connection to the Puerto Rican community in Brooklyn, and by proxy, her adult children. When their mother starts connecting to Olga and Prieto from absentia, intent on advancing the causes of Puerto Ricans through her well-connected children, Olga and Prieto must decide to what extremes family and heritage will dictate the direction of their lives, personally and politically. 

Gonzalez uses fictional storytelling to educate readers on the realities for those living in Puerto Rico, especially during and after Hurricanes Irma and Maria. What begins as a novel seemingly dedicated to New York society and those inhabiting the burrows quickly shifts to examine historical wrongs and continued neglect of Puerto Rico, an American territory without political representation or political power. This novel is at its best when it makes commentary through story, as some of the direct attacks can read preachy. All the same, I greatly enjoyed this novel, as each turn kept me invested in the lives of these siblings that are able to glimpse America from both inside and outside of its borders. In a way, this novel is a love letter to Puerto Rico and a plea for the island and its citizens to receive the attention they deserve. 

“You must remember, Mijo, even people who were once your sails can become your anchors.”