A Beginner’s Guide to America (Part 2) by Roya Hakakian

Friday, January 28 through Monday, February 7, 2022. Read by Michele Good.

Written as a “guide” for the newly arrived, and providing “practical information and advice,” Roya Hakakian, an immigrant herself, reveals what those who settle here love about the country, what they miss about their homes, the cruelty of some Americans, and the unceasing generosity of others. With tenderness and humor, she captures the texture of life in a new place in all its complexity, laying bare both its beauty and its darkness as she discusses race, love, death, consumerism, and what it is like to be from a country that is in America’s crosshairs. Her tenderly perceptive and surprisingly humorous account invites us to see ourselves as we appear to others, making it possible for us to rediscover our many American gifts through the perspective of the outsider.

(Alfred A Knopf; ISBN: 9780525656067)

Theme: “America”, Soundtrack of West Side Story, Leonard Bernstein