Visiting Hours (2012) by Jennifer Anne Moses

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

Visting Hours (2012)

by Jennifer Anne Moses

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Louisiana 29/30

  I am missing one book from Louisiana, and I can't figure it out for the life of me.  As far as I'm aware, Visiting Hours is the last book from this chapter of the 1,001 Novels: A Library of American project. Visiting Hours was last because I had to buy a copy- I was surprised didn't have this interesting novel about the grim lives of patients waiting to die in an AIDS hostel in... the 1990s? The early 2000s?  It actually really reminded me of Blackouts by Justin Torres, the 2023 National Book Award for Fiction winner, which concerns a man dying of AIDS (I think) in a New Orleans SRO.  

  I could have used more Bayou.  I'm really loving the swamp-lit of Florida, and Louisiana seems like a missed opportunity in that regard, maybe because the geographical location overlaps so completely with the Cajun population that one supersedes the other.   One other conclusion I drew from this chapter is that Hurricane Katrina did real damage to the city both physically AND psychically.