Being in Brooklyn

Being in Brooklyn is an intimate, raw and uncensored glimpse into the life of Liam, a young Polish immigrant, during his first three years in Brooklyn, NY. Liam is a rising teenage soccer star in Europe, when a broken leg puts his career on hold and prompts him to accept an invitation from his American uncle to live in the US for six months. This fateful decision changes forever the trajectory of his life. Liam moves to America, speaking no English, without a high school education, few connections and no money. Six months stretch into three years—the reader journeys with Liam as he grapples with the realities of coming-of-age as an immigrant in the US: poverty, sex, drinking, fighting, relationships, college, soccer, family disputes, and the working world. Liam’s deep-seated faith, grounded in his traditional Catholic upbringing, is startlingly juxtaposed against his secular environment and party lifestyle. He wrestles with an existential crisis and begins to tackle the larger, more profound questions around love, God, and the meaning of life. Underneath his entrenched and ferocious cynicism lies an unquenchable longing for the ideal—Beauty, Truth, and Goodness—which is ultimately found in the teaching of the Catholic Church: “Oh, Beauty that is ever ancient and ever new…”