Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
A wholesome coming-of-age novel about two lesbian high-school basketball stars, Revoyr's debut is a meditation on consuming passion and a reflection on lost opportunities. Narrator Nancy Takahiro, a Japanese-American teen growing up in predominantly black South Central Los Angeles, is awestruck when she first sees fellow high-school sophomore Raina Webber (who's black) play basketball. Nancy is on the team, too, and her awe develops into a minor obsessionDand then a full-fledged crush. Awkward everywhere but on the court, Nancy is further flustered when, two years later, Nancy's father and Raina's mother meet and fall in loveDand Raina and her mother move in with the Takahiros. The basketball action, which builds climactically, honors the split-second timing and excitement of the game. Revoyr also evokes the feel of contemporary L.A., capturing crackheads, gangbangers and car-jackings in sharp, street-smart dialogue. A handful of engaging subplotsDincluding Raina's mother's conflict with friends over dating a non-black manDexamine contemporary issues of race, sexuality and fairness. In portraying the pressure and passion of athletic competition, and all the sweetness and yearning of first love, Revoyr's writing isn't showy. Her game is more like Nancy's than Raina's, not flashy but fundamentally solid. (Feb.)
Library Journal
In Revoyr's first novel, Japanese American Nancy Takahiro recounts her days as a high school basketball star in South Central Los Angeles. Soon, African American Raina Webber, a star at a rival school, and her mother move into Nancy's home. Both young women are gay, and Nancy must come to grips with feelings for her new housemate that go beyond the scope of athletics. Revoyr focuses on a number of issues, including competition, interracial relationships, and same-sex relationships. In its presentation of the challenges of living in the 'hood, her work is reminiscent of Sheneska Jackson's Caught Up in the Rapture (LJ 4/15/96). While Revoyr doesn't delve into the complexities of interracial relationships as deeply as the issues of sports and interpersonal relationships, she does question whether love can truly transcend social boundaries. A thoughtful work for larger fiction collections.-Shirley N. Quan, Orange County P.L., Garden Grove, Cal.
School Library Journal
Two young women grapple with the stress of competitive high school basketball, college recruiters, their sexual identities, racism, and the interracial love story of their parents. Enough here to appease appetites for drama. (Dec.)
Kirkus Reviews
Low-key but refreshing girls 'n' the `hood debut novel about a pair of furiously competitive basketball stars searching for love and certainty in the dank gymnasiums and mean streets of South Central L.A.
The familiar inner-city downers of racism, crime, family disintegration, and sports-as-salvation are handled with extraordinary intelligence and sensitivity in this episodic story. Teenager Nancy Takahiro, a shy, six-foot Japanese-American basketball player, lives in a small suburban tract house with her divorced father, Wendell, a high-school math teacher and football coach. When Wendell invites his girlfriend, divorcée Claudia Webber, a circulation manager for the L.A. Times, to move in with him, Claudia, an African-American, brings her daughter, Raina Webber, a ferociously aggressive basketball star who plays at a different high school that's in a different league. The two girls are not only the same age but also "members of the family"—that is, lesbian. As their parents endure racial stigmatism from former friends, what could have been a simple sibling rivalry becomes something far more complicated as Nancy becomes emotionally—and sexually—infatuated with Raina, who, though five inches shorter than Nancy, has the gutsy, American street-smart confidence that Nancy feels she lacks. Author Revoyr dodges the easy clichés of ghetto melodrama—nobody gets pregnant or has a drug problem here; everybody has enough to eat; and violence and crime, while evident, happen elsewhere—as she sends Nancy and Raina toward an ultimate confrontation in a league playoff, where Nancy's turbulent uncertainties about herself, as well as her unrequited affection for Raina, make the outcome of the game more than a matter of winning or losing.
A quietly intimate, vigorously honest, and uniquely American hoop dream: tough and tender, without a single false note.
Cleveland Plain Dealer
"Revoyr has unerringly caught the angst of teenagers, as well as the rarified, self-involved world in which they live . . . A sympathetic, tender rendering of the frustration of unrequited love."
Detroit Free Press
"Revoyr triumphs in blending many complex issues, including urban poverty and violence, adolescent sexuality, and the vitality of basketball, without losing sight of her characters. She creates a family, in all senses of the word, of characters who are complex, admirable, and aggravating; readers will root for them on and off the court."
Asian Pages
"The Necessary Hunger is a moving, insightful story about family, friendship, and young people coming of age with the cards stacked against them."
From the Publisher
"Revoyr has unerringly caught the angst of teenagers, as well as the rarified, self-involved world in which they live...A sympathetic, tender rendering of the frustration of unrequited love."
—Cleveland Plain Dealer
"This book may in fact contain the most loving prose we'll see on basketball until John Edgar Wideman writes about his daughter Jamila, the gifted point guard for Stanford...A soul-baring that grows deeply moving."
—Chicago Tribune
"Revoyr focuses on a number of issues, including competition, interracial relationships, and same-sex relationships...A thoughtful work..."
—Library Journal
"The Necessary Hunger is a moving, insightful story about family, friendship, and young people coming of age with the cards stacked against them."
—Asian Pages
Critical Praise for Wingshooters by Nina Revoyr:
A Booklist Book of the Year 2011
Finalist for SCIBA's 2011 Fiction Award
Winner of the 2011 Midwest Booksellers Choice Award
Winner of the first annual Indie Booksellers Choice Award
Selected for IndieBound's March 2011 Indie Next List, "Great Reads from Booksellers You Trust"
Featured in O, The Oprah Magazine's March 2011 Reading Room section as one of "10 Titles to Pick Up Now"
"Revoyr does a remarkable job of conveying [protagonist] Michelle's lost innocence and fear through this accomplished story of family and the dangers of complacency in the face of questionable justice."
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Revoyr writes rhapsodically of a young girl's enthrallment to the natural world and charts, with rising intensity, her resilient narrator's painful awakening to human failings and senseless violence. In this shattering northern variation on To Kill A Mockingbird, Revoyr drives to the very heart of tragic ignorance, unreason, and savagery."
—Booklist (starred review)
"Hauntingly provocative...an excellent choice for book discussion groups as it will force readers to dig deep and look inward."
—Library Journal
"Gripping and insightful."
—Kirkus Reviews
"A searing, anguished novel...The narration and pace are expertly calibrated as it explores a topic one wishes still wasn't so current."
—Los Angeles Times
"Much can be said and commended about the book's themes of loyalty and love...I'll just say that this author is a big talent. Her book is a little thing of beauty. It's a story with American historical significance; it's a novel with emotional heft; it's a satisfying read in the spirit of what Picasso said about another writer, James Joyce: 'The incomprehensible that everyone can understand.'"
—Brooklyn Rail
