Editorial Review

“Steve Brezenoff’s Brooklyn, Burning is what I want out of a novel: it’s funny and sad (but not always when you expect it to be), plotted tight as a plumb line without ever letting you see that till the end, pops you with the surprises of human kindness and decency even more than it startles you with plunges into the depths. As good an example as you will find that the novel is the art that can go broad and deep at the same time, it tackles the kind of difficult question that only the novel can do: what will we do with all the unwanted talent and rejected love in the world, and how will the kids (and the Kids) cope when they find out they’re wanted after all? What happens when kids are loaded up with far more than anyone should have to bear, and they bear it, and go on? Like any good novel, it’s one particular, memorable, answer in a form so vivid it will stay with you forever. All that, and he did it for a bunch of kids, who will now probably sneak off and savor it all by themselves, as if it were for their generation and not for all time. Don’t let the kids hide this in the cellar; drag it upstairs where everyone can enjoy it.” —John Barnes , Printz Honoree