This is the 38th book I've already read this year which puts me on pace to shatter my previous yearly high of 58. Last year I read 49. I say that because I think I'm getting more discerning or just more cranky about what I'm reading. This is probably a 4 star book but the things about it that bothered me really bothered me, probably more than they should have, and that made me knock the rating down. Of course 3 stars is listed as "liked it" so that is probably fine but in past years this probably would have been a 4. My feelings about this book fluctuated as I moved through it, it was a 5 for a long time, dropped down to the 3, came back up to a 4, and ended up at 3. The book has a good feel for its environment and it presents a vibrant portrait of a community with some issues. I liked a lot of the set up and the way all the characters were given to us. But as it went on I began to feel like the characters were very much stereotypes and I found them all to be people I did not like. Look, I don't need sunshine and puppy tails, but I do need someone who I can grab on to. The closest here is Cree but he suffers from living almost entirely in the past and in his grievances and yeah, I get it, but I don't necessary want to spend hundreds of pages in it. Consistently people in this book refuse to figure out what they can do to help themselves in the here and now. I found myself almost yelling at the page, "hey music teacher, why don't you NOT DRINK TOINGHT?" It would have done no good. The final straw for me was the overwhelming presence of magic realism that really drives the entire story. I have a very tenuous relationship with magic realism in my fiction. The outlier is Haruki Murakami who is probably my favorite active writer and one who lives in magic realism, but he is the exception that proves the rule for me. In this story I got so tired of the "visitations" of the dead and spirits and blah blah blah. See what I mean about being cranky? I know I'm being too hard on this book but since the only reason I rate these and write reviews is for my own reference I don't think I need to get permission. This is a real written and interesting book that did not work for ME. Your milage may vary. ( )

Ivy Pachoda writes very well. Visitation Street is a written pictorial of life in the Red Hook neighborhood in Brooklyn, where the storyline revolves around two young white girls who capsize on a pink raft in the treacherous waters in NY harbor. Revolving around a cast of characters, including a Lebanese bodega owner, some black kids from the projects, including a gifted graffiti tagger, and down on his luck musician, Pochoda has crafted an emotional and engaging mystery filled with ghosts of the past, lost opportunities, death, and dreams of a better future. Recommended. ( )

Red Hook, Brooklyn character study
Review of the Harper Collins paperback edition (2013) of the original Dennis Lehane/Ecco hardcover (2013)

Visitation Street is an excellent character study which is initiated by two reckless teenage girls deciding to take a rubber raft ride on the seashore of Red Hook, Brooklyn. Val is found unconscious on the shore the next morning and June is lost. The book toggles among various characters in the community who are affected by this. These are primarily Val herself; Cree, a friend of the lost girls, Jonathan, a failed musician/schoolteacher who rescues Val; Monique, a friend of Cree; Fadi, a bodega owner and the mysterious Ren, who is attempting to redeem himself for what is, at first, unknown reasons.

This was a strong character portrait novel with a small touch of mystery elements with solutions which become guessable along the way. It is especially strong as a 2nd novel and appears to be Pochoda's best received book to date based on its Goodreads ranking. It was also the second selection of veteran noir & mystery writer Dennis Lehane's eponymous imprint for Ecco Books.

I read Visitation Street due to a blind pick of a surprise bag from my local Toronto Public Library. During the pandemic, when browsing of the library shelves is not allowed, the staff have prepared "Surprise Bags" with curated selections. Coincidentally, I had also recently read Ivy Pochoda's These Women (2020), which is a shortlist nominee for Best Novel at the 2021 Edgar Awards, voted on by the Mystery Writers of America.

Trivia and Link
I would especially recommend reading Will Byrne's extra-length review with its added feature of location photographs of the Red Hook community. ( )

June and Val are bored fifteen-year-old girls on that summer night they decide to take a rubber raft down to the water and float around a bit. They only looking for a bit of adventure, something to occupy their time during that summer that they're too young to join the older teenagers partying and too young to be content with a backyard sleepover, but only one girl will survive their excursion.

This is packaged as a crime novel, but its far more ambitious than that. Set in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Red Hook, the novel follows several characters who were altered by the night's events, from the girl left alone to be an object of curiosity and gossip, to the man who rescued her, to the owner of a local convenience store hoping to create a sense of community out of the very different groups living in the area. Visitation Street examines what makes a neighborhood into a community, and how hard it can be to move forward while living half in the past.

There are too many point-of-view characters for this novel to hold together, but Pochoda has a talent for creating complex, nuanced characters from a variety of backgrounds. I look forward to reading her novels as she progresses as an author. ( )

From the description I thought this was a murder mystery. It is not. It is a beautifully written tale of the aftermath of a tragedy. Two young girls, bored, hot, restless, grab an inflatable raft and jump into the East River off the pier in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Things go wrong, and not just for the girls, but for many in their troubled community. Insightful, moving writing, wonderfully fully drawn out characters, surprises both happy and heartbreaking!
Again, for an amazing review - with photos of locations scouted in Red Bank and comments from the author, see Will Brynes here at Goodreads!! ( )