At once a tender coming-of-age story and a pointed social commentary, Amanda Rizkalla's debut novel, Hungered, examines a family in crisis from the perspective of Sofia, a 12-year-old girl. Sofia, her younger brother, Rafa, and their mother are living in their car after fleeing Sofia's violent father, who has moved his pregnant mistress into the family home. Although she is a nurse, Sofia's mother does not make enough money at her clinic job to provide the deposit she needs for an apartment in addition to paying for their immediate needs. While naïve, Sofia is intelligent and observant. When she sees her mother applying "berry lipstick," putting her hair up, and meeting a man at a motel with "a small flat square in her hand," she understands the depth of her mother's desperation. Throughout their ordeal, however, Sofia displays a determined resilience. She cherishes reading and her access to free books at the library, forms a friendship with a classmate named Ana, and records her wishes and dreams in her journal. It isn't until Rafa becomes ill that Sofia falters and begs her mother to seek help from her estranged grandfather.
With spare, elegant prose, Rizkalla captures the world and its contradictions perfectly through Sofia's eyes. There are helpers who extend kindnesses: the lunch lady who gives Sofia extra helpings and a good Samaritan who offers the family temporary housing. Yet, as Sofia relates with heartbreaking simplicity, they are battling a system that is stacked against them. Thoughtful and wise, Hungered is a powerful and resonant read. --Debra Ginsberg, author and freelance editor