lianaespey's review
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
fast-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal cruelty and Animal death
Minor: Chronic illness
esdeecarlson's review
5.0
**This book was provided to me by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.**
A highly engaging and readable memoir.
Told in short, digestible vignettes, Gentrifier recounts the experience of the author after being “gifted” a “free” house in an underserved neighborhood in Detroit. Both Moore’s personal experience and the history of the house itself turn out to be more complicated, particularly within the broader American and Detroit-centric history of race, class, and power, than initially meets the eye.
What I particularly like about the memoir is that it knows when to pull back. My favorite vignettes concern the children in Moore’s neighborhood, particularly Nishat and Sadia, and the friendship Moore forms with them. A lesser writer would take this opportunity to reflect upon her own contributions to the girls’ lives; instead, Moore lets the girls speak through their own words and actions, and does away with any self-indulgent or self-centering reflection. She peppers in historical data when necessary, but this book isn’t a history of redlining or immigration or gentrification on a large scale—merely one woman’s, and “her” house’s, rather conflicted roles within it.
A highly engaging and readable memoir.
Told in short, digestible vignettes, Gentrifier recounts the experience of the author after being “gifted” a “free” house in an underserved neighborhood in Detroit. Both Moore’s personal experience and the history of the house itself turn out to be more complicated, particularly within the broader American and Detroit-centric history of race, class, and power, than initially meets the eye.
What I particularly like about the memoir is that it knows when to pull back. My favorite vignettes concern the children in Moore’s neighborhood, particularly Nishat and Sadia, and the friendship Moore forms with them. A lesser writer would take this opportunity to reflect upon her own contributions to the girls’ lives; instead, Moore lets the girls speak through their own words and actions, and does away with any self-indulgent or self-centering reflection. She peppers in historical data when necessary, but this book isn’t a history of redlining or immigration or gentrification on a large scale—merely one woman’s, and “her” house’s, rather conflicted roles within it.
bexellency's review
2.0
Not great. Memoir is this genre that lets you get away with anything. Non-sequitors, personal anecdotes unrelated to the theme, lazy and disjointed writing, etc. Nominally about gentrification but in practice more about living into a community as a minority within that community, misogyny, chronic illness, scraping together a lifestyle with no traditional employment, etc. I picked this up looking for a book that would offer insights and thought experiments on the ethics of personal action within the larger context of gentrification - something for aspiring homeowners similar to what the Blue Sweater does for aid work and philanthropy. Instead got mostly narcissistic memoir with one heavy handed chapter on foreclosures. Luckily, it was short.
liralen's review
4.0
It's the American dream and the writer's dream: a house of one's own, a room of one's own. For Moore, it was almost an accident: when she got the call, she'd forgotten that she'd applied to an organisation giving houses in Detroit to writers. Suddenly (if 'suddenly' can include many month of red tape and delays) she had a house; suddenly she lived in Detroit.
Structurally, the book reminds me a bit of [b:Ghost Songs|29069366|Ghost Songs A Memoir|Regina McBride|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1458831195l/29069366._SY75_.jpg|49299002]—some longer sections, but many many short sections that are more or less anecdotal but build on one another. Observations about the house, about the arts organisation (not named in the book, but findable online), about life in the neighbourhood; news items illustrating just how badly residents—particularly Black and low-income residents—can be screwed over in home ownership laws; about Detroit generally. It's not a style that will work for everyone, but I loved the bite-sized impressions, which in some ways feel like they told me more than fewer but longer scenes would.
A last quote, just because think it says something about the underfunded, undervalued education system—underfunded, undervalued public services in general—in Detroit:
Shortly before I move, I am on a train passing through Michigan in idle conversation with my seatmate. She is older than I am and suffers similar physical ailments, so we swap stories about medications and doctors between comments on the landscape.
“Where do you live?” she asks at one point.
“Chicago,” I tell her, “but I will move to Detroit soon.”
“Oh, honey,” she says, patting my arm. “You’re not supposed to say ‘Detroit.’ Call it southeastern Michigan. Otherwise people will know.” (7)Moore wasn't necessarily an obvious fit, as a white woman placed in a majority-Bangladeshi neighbourhood in a majority-Black city. This little house was home, but what does that mean in the face of promises the arts organisation can't deliver on, and a local government with a long history of disenfranchising its poorest residents, and the knowledge that by being a (white-collar) white person in a majority non-white space one is impacting that space in ways one can't control?
Structurally, the book reminds me a bit of [b:Ghost Songs|29069366|Ghost Songs A Memoir|Regina McBride|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1458831195l/29069366._SY75_.jpg|49299002]—some longer sections, but many many short sections that are more or less anecdotal but build on one another. Observations about the house, about the arts organisation (not named in the book, but findable online), about life in the neighbourhood; news items illustrating just how badly residents—particularly Black and low-income residents—can be screwed over in home ownership laws; about Detroit generally. It's not a style that will work for everyone, but I loved the bite-sized impressions, which in some ways feel like they told me more than fewer but longer scenes would.
I walk across the street one day in the middle of summer with no shoes on and chat with the children a bit. “Anne,” they say, “you forgot your shoes!”
“Oh, no,” I scoff. “It’s No-Shoe Tuesday. Where I come from, you don’t wear shoes on Tuesday.”
For three years, every Tuesday, the girls across the street scream “No-Shoe Tuesday!” and me and fling their footwear across the porch, no matter the season. (141)---
The teenaged boys in my neighborhood are all exceedingly polite, and even when they get together at night to cause trouble or do some marauding, they usually end up staying within earshot of their mothers or fixing another neighbor’s car for free. I keep hoping that I will catch them at the neighborhood skate park, but none of them ever go there, I suspect because they are shy in front of other kids. Finally, one day, I get very exciting about the possibility that there are some real troublemakers around when I spot some spray-painted text on the side of first one building, then another. The same text. It is nearly illegible in both occurrences, but the word “Rupna” can be read clearly. I ask around about who the vandal is, the tagger, but no one knows. Finally I meet a young girl who has information on the hoodlum. “It’s my brother Rupna,” she says. “It means ‘Rupna is the best.’”
“Ah!” I say. “And he is tagging the neighborhood!” I am thrilled.
“No,” she says, “first just our house. He had to wait a few weeks before he got permission to write it also on our grandma’s house.” (152)The organisation that awarded Moore a 'free' house is no longer giving out houses (I haven't done enough digging to figure out whether they were part of a bigger organisation that might still be doing things); it sounds like their good intentions were bigger than their pockets, and ultimately they couldn't sustain their initial momentum. (Slash they needed a different model, and deeper pockets, and perhaps a very wealthy backer or two, and so on and so forth...perhaps most, they needed to be able to pivot when things didn't go to plan.) Readers might find this article to provide a little more context, though beware—there is a bit of a spoiler for Gentrifier.
A last quote, just because think it says something about the underfunded, undervalued education system—underfunded, undervalued public services in general—in Detroit:
I return from Europe and go to the bank to exchange and deposit my remaining euros, but the bank teller can’t figure out what country they’re from. “They’re euros,” I explain. “They’re a currency a lot of countries in Europe use.” She doesn’t believe me. Eventually she tells me I should try again on a different day, preferably when she isn’t working. Then she leans in toward the window and, in a lowered voice, promises not to tell anyone the bills are obviously fake. (103)