3 Grownup Reads
by Jamie L. Watson
The best books will always allow you a little escape or distraction, something else to focus on than the world around
you. These three debut novels, books I read before the pandemic, gave me that escape. I hope they do the same for
you during this challenging time.

‘The Operator’
Nostalgia is one way of escape. In
Gretchen Berg’s “The Operator,”
we go back to a time before social
media, to a time when switchboard
operators had to make every tele-
phone connection. In a small town
where gossip is currency, the tid-
bits overheard by the operators can
change a life. When Vivian Dalton
overhears something about her
own family, it sends her on a jour-
ney of discovery fueled by pettiness
against the owner of the gossip.

There aren’t a lot of characters to root for here, but the depiction
of small-town dynamics is spot on, including provincial newspa-
pers, independent dress shops and the tiniest bit of class warfare.

A subplot about two “lovers” who rob a bank eventually ties into
the whole story, one that will manage to surprise.

‘Saint X’
Alexis Schaitkin’s “Saint X”
is a narrative built on shift-
ing sands less sturdy than any
tropical beach. On a family vaca-
tion to the fictional Caribbean
island of Saint X, 7-year-old
Claire’s older sister disappears
and a few days later is found
dead. The main suspects, two
resort employees, are cleared,
and eventually her death is ruled an accident. The parents push
their grief deep inside, while Claire, now an adult, lives with it
more viscerally, even before a chance meeting with Clive, one of
the suspects, on the streets of New York. Chapters shift back and
forth in time and perspective. A murder mystery on the surface,
this book doesn’t shy away from deep issues of class, race and,
more importantly, how we are all a product of our circumstances.

This emotionally powerful book will stick with you long after the
vacation is over.

‘Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line’
Similar issues of class, gender and religious divisions occur in Deepa Anappara’s “Djinn Patrol on
the Purple Line,” narrated 9-year-old Jai, who fights with his sister and loves police reality shows
in his Indian home city. Jai and his friends, smart girl Pari and a Muslim named Faiz, live in a slum,
and their families work for the “hi-fis” in the gated community nearby. When a friend goes miss-
ing, the children play detective, even as Faiz is convinced the disappearances are the result of
angering djinns. The use of a child narrator is powerful, as we see a multilayered, tragic situation
through the eyes of a naïve, resilient boy. The prejudice toward the Muslim members of the com-
munity, the on-the-take police and the fate of the children are tempered through Jai’s sweet voice
and a little bit of magical realism.

30 Washington FAMILY JUNE 2020