cover image Brooklyn Story

Brooklyn Story

Suzanne Corso, S&S/Gallery, $26 (336p) ISBN 978-1-4391-9022-7

Tony Manero wouldn't be out of place in this competent coming-of-age debut set in 1978 Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, where Samantha Bonti longs to make it in the big time across the East River. With her Smith-Corona, ambition, good looks, and little else—Sam's Jewish mom's a bitter, drunken mess on welfare, her Italian dad's long gone—the 15-year-old negotiates the shady world of the "Brooklyn Boys" and what it means to be the girlfriend of mob acolyte Tony Kroon. "All ya need is me," he ominously insists. Corso gets the Brooklyn dialect pitch-perfect and keeps the pace brisk, and though the narration too often reads like stage notes, the universal story of longing, loyalty, and growing up rings true. (Jan.)