Cyn Vargas's debut collection, On the Way, is marked by a sense of universal heartbreak and hope. In a dozen stories that quietly and considerately follow the lives of displaced, alienated Central Americans whose lives revolve around immigration, expatriation and escapes, Vargas shows how deeply many of the world's upheavals affect individuals.
In the first story, Selma is barely a teenager when her mother takes her to Guatemala to meet her relatives for the first time. When her mother goes missing, it is only after the family sends Selma back to the U.S. that her willful blindness clears like a storm and she sees, finally, that her mom is gone forever.
In another story, a jaded driving instructor falls in love with his exotic student during a 10-minute driving test. In another, a girl grows up burdened with a truth no one else thought she knew. In the final story, a girl tortured by her dad's absence waits desperately for her mother to come home from work after her dad reappears. Vargas's stories are not connected by character or plot but by an emotional thread that swells beyond the book's sparse style.
Vargas deftly uses a candid, unadorned voice to frame an often unkind world. Her hopeful conclusion in these tales, though, is that nobody is ever truly alone. --Josh Potter