African Literature Books

This was the absolute WORST book I've ever read in my life. My English teacher made me read it over the summer and I hated it. It's this boring hard to understand book about this guy in Nigeria just livin' his life. Then he accedentally kills this kid and is sent into excile for seven years. These people come from Europe trying to make the people more civilized and become Christians. So this guy gets mad when he comes back from exile. While they were at a meeting trying to figure out what to do, a messenger comes and the guy gets mad and shoots him. Then he goes home and hangs himself. All of that happens in the three hundred pages. It was an awful book and I would not suggest it to anyone. I wish I could give it no stars. Yeah, it was that bad.

This is probably the worst book I've ever read. It's very difficult to follow and leaves out much which could explain to the uninitiate the point of the book. As someone who has read thousands of books (literally!), I found this one stilted and forced, unreadable, pointless, unpleasant, poor character development, etc. ad nauseum. The only reason I read it is that I couldn't believe my 8th grader when he said the teacher who assigned it said it was a bad book (and, yes, she assigned it anyway!). It is an excellent example of how not to write a book you want people to read. Avoid this one like the plague, unless you've read every other book on the face of the planet.

Chinua Achebe is an accomplished Nigerian writer. "Things Fall Apart" is reputed by Wikipedia to be the most widely read book in modern African literature and has made Achebe the most widely translated African writer of all time.

The book deals with the impact of a foreign culture (the British Empire expanding into Nigeria) on the traditional ways of life and tribal beliefs of the Ibo people of Nigeria. History tells us who inevitably won that "clash of civilisations".

In the book the destruction of a tribal community comes at the hands of well-meaning, but fundamentally arrogant, Christian missionaries, supported by the "civilising mission" of government officials.

Many of the old Ibo beliefs and customs (at least as described by Achebe) were violent and superstitious. The superstition should be no problem for any objective reader - after all, it is simply a different form of spiritual belief to that which most Western readers will be used to, no worse and no better than any of the major religions, just different.

Unfortunately for the Ibo, it was these very beliefs that the christian missionaries found repugnant - perhaps more so than the violence.

However, it is the violence of men towards one another and towards women and children that will appal most modern readers.

Of course, this is a work of fiction and the non-Nigerian reader has no hope of knowing how realistic is the traditional village culture portrayed. Nigerian readers will immediately be able to put it into the correct perspective.

Without any other cultural background or context, books like this in the hands of the unthinking reader can perpetuate stereotypes and even do harm. There is already too much ignorance of, and intolerance to, the customs of other people. One has only to think of today's general ignorance and stereotyping of Muslims - and the general ignorance and stereotyping of Russians during the Cold War.

Sadly, traditional customs and beliefs, even languages, are under increasing threat from the blandishments of the modern world. This is a pity. Most cultural beliefs have a valid place in the human community and are worthy of preservation, as an historical and anthropological record if nothing else. Many of the social and other problems that beset traditional peoples can be laid at the feet of the destruction of customs and beliefs.

The challenge is not only to protect traditional customs, but also to do so in ways that are consistent with preventing violence in those communities. It is difficult, for example, to make any case in favour of female circumcision.

On another level the book can be read as the human tragedy of the principal character, Okonkwo. To our eyes he is a flawed figure, but to his tribe he was an important man.

Achebe's style is very spare and the text is pared to the bone, with few adjectives and adverbs. Sentence constructions are very simple - but not naïve or unsophisticated. Hemingway and other famous writers used a similar style. I like it very much.

I found it helpful to read the Wikipedia entries after I had started the book. This gave me some background and made my reading a more meaningful exercise.

This book made me confront important matters: the clash of civilisations and comparative spiritual beliefs. "Things Fall Apart" is an important book and worth reading.

I know this is the classic debate of all time when it comes to literature: Is it about beautifully written prose (THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE, incidentally, is a good example of this problem) or does it tell a compelling story? (yet the prose itself is not its strong point).

It seems that many works of fiction these days are of the former and unfortunately, not enough of the latter. I recently re-read this book along with another classic, JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN, after a discussion I had with a friend about this very subject. As a middle-aged person, I often look back at the books that made a difference in my life and much of the time, it's not about the author's writing style. Achebe's is a plain, straightforward style, but it's what he is conveying that is so striking about this story. (I am a bit miffed at the "English" teachers and the like who are downing this book!) Bottom line: I was left with a lasting impression that stayed with me. I can't say that many books do this today.

All I can say is pick up this read and decide for yourselves. Bottom line, this story is just as relevant today as it was so many years ago when it first appeared. These issues are universal and the world today is replete with similar conflicts. It's unfortunate to have to go back in time to find classic works of fiction, but sometimes there are exceptions. Check out--SIM0N LAZARUS, a word of mouth wonder more should know about.

I was surprised and disappointed in some of the incredibly harsh reviews of this book. Since I've read a decent amount of African literature (not a vast amount), my first thoughts are that "Things Fall Apart" isn't superior to some of those novels. However, it is also important to realize this was a pre-cursor and likely an influence on many if not all of those more recent novels. One needs to think about the historical context and timeframe that this book was written in, the late 1950s. There had not been a large acceptance nor critical recognition of African literature in the Western world during that time, especially of literature from Africa. Achebe's novel had played a critical roled putting African literature on the world map.

The novel centers on one of the leaders of a Nigerian tribe, Okonkwo. Achebe divides the novel into three parts -- setting up tribal life and the Okonkwo's family, his exile to his mother's ancestral tribe and Okonkwo's return to his tribe. The other important theme underlying the story centers on the impact of colonialism, specifically Christianity, on African tribal life.

What "Things Fall Apart" provides us with is deeper knowledge of African tribal life, the customs and mores of a people and the affect of outside influences, in this case Western culture, on traditional tribal life. The book has an elegant simplicity to it, matching the picture Achebe paints of tribal life. While there are a few bits that move slowly, this is a short book and is worthy of a read for both the influence and impact it has had on African literature as well as the the knowledge of a different culture and people that many of us are unlikely to encounter during our life.

This is a book about a woman who killed one of her children to keep them from being a slave. (Why did she kill that particular child and not the others?) Later the child comes back, fully living in adult form because of how much they loved each other, or something like that. Get out of here. That's so ridiculous I can't even suspend my disbelief. The mother and the revived ghost-daughter end up being co-dependent and obsessed with each other, and some other drama ensues. The grammar is purposely very poor and some of the chapters were done entirely in poems with a lot of symbolism that didn't really fit into the story, and seemed to be there just because of how it sounded.

There were some good parts to the book, like some of the characters and the talking about the past, but I really think this book is highly overrated, and I'm someone who loves to read; classics, modern books, junk books, you name it. I'm going to be very controversial and say that whatever judges decide books are "great" have a bias: if a black person writes about slavery, the book is automatically considered a classic, just because of the subject matter. (And maybe it's like this with other historic horrors too.) Well I'm sorry, but I still think a book needs to be well-written, regardless of the subject matter. To Kill A Mockingbird was an excellent book about racism, and Amy Tan writes a lot of great books about the lives of Chinese immigrants. These books are about heavy subjects, but the writers actually took the effort and told a real story with a strong plot. I'm sure there are also great books about slavery and that I will find them, but this a mediocre book that just happens to be about slavery.

Beloved is a riveting story, a page-turner. It reminds me of The Turn of the Screw in that you are never certain what was real and what wasn't. Do you believe in the supernatural or is it mental distress? Awesome review of slavery every white American should read. But the story is the thing - and it is really something!

Admittedly, I was lost at times while reading this, read many a chapter and sentence over and over, but by the end, I found the effort more than worth it. I can't pretend to know what it must have been like for women/slaves like Sethe, but if I've now gleaned even an inkling, this was the story that did it.

Much like after reading the Color Purple, I found myself thinking about this story again and again, and would highly recommend it for anyone with the patience to see it through. The pay off is well worth it.

I have to admit, I approached this novel with quite a bit of trepidation. It was an Oprah's book club pick, which generally means depressing, and I tend to be leery of "highly acclaimed" books. Maybe a bit of reverse snobbishness. But I've been making a point lately of ignoring my knee-jerk reactions and trying to check things out before I judge them.

If you haven't heard anything about it, Beloved is the story of Sethe and her daughter Denver, who live alone with a ghost now that her mother-in-law has died and her two sons have left home. A man from Sethe's past shows up, Paul D., and then a young woman, Beloved, who becomes ever more demanding.

Through a series of flashbacks and memories, we get the picture of Sethe's life, and how and why it culminated in her killing one of her children and attempting to kill the others. I'd been forewarned about that, so it wasn't as much of a shock as it might have been.

Beloved is a powerful novel. I can't really express it any other way. It provides an unvarnished look at a period in history that would be more comfortable to forget. But if that were all it was, I wouldn't have liked it so much. I'm not one to hide my head in the sand, but I don't see the point of dwelling on the horrors people inflict on each other, either. I like to know and then move on.

It's also a story of community, and how people react as groups. Sethe was rejected by her community, not as much because she'd killed her child, but because she was too independent. It's an interesting concept, and one that applies very much to me as well--like Sethe, I find it shameful to ask for help, preferring to do without than to reach out. So the story hit me on that level as well.

But for me, mostly, it was a story of guilt, and how Sethe's guilt manifested itself (literally), and how she needed to accept help to forgive herself. And that's what really made the story for me.

I doubt I'll re-read this, at least not for a long time, but I'm very glad I did.

I'm always trying to read books that are hailed as good, hoping to enjoy them as much as everyone else does. I'm sad to say that this book didn't agree with me. This isn't to say that it isn't a good book- after all, this review is just my opinion.
Much of the book confused me because the book went back and forth in time in paragraphs. On one page, the first paragraph would be twenty years in the past, and the next paragraph would be five years in the past, and the third paragraph would be in the present. (by present I mean late 1800's).
Sometimes even in one paragraph the story would go through several different events over several different years. This confused me to the point where I had no idea what was going on! So I didn't enjoy it very much. But oh, how I wanted to! It seemed like it would be a book I would enjoy.

There's a good chance you're buying this book because it's assigned reading for a class. Go into that classroom and THANK YOUR TEACHER. I didn't read this book in school. I stumbled upon when I was done with school. I bought it because I thought the title was interesting. What I found inside this book stunned me. The voice is so strong you can feel it in your heart. The writing is beautiful. The story will shake you. Enjoy!

Please read this book! I'm serious! The writing is pure poetry, with fantastic images that will stay with me forever. Also, the historical value cannot be exaggerated. The author, Nora Neale Hurston, gave us a tremendous gift.

I personally enjoyed the use of dialect. I read some of the book aloud to my daughter which is a good way to experience the beauty of their speak. All good books show you things you could never see and enlighten your mind to ways that were unknown. So that when we are done reading their gift stays with us.

This book sucked. Richard Wright was correct when he stated that Zora Neale Hurston pandered to white prejudiced readers. The way Hurston's black characters speak in this book portrays African Americans as stupid, easily fooled, and naive. The story was boring, pointless, and poorly written. The book, in short, was unbelievably bad, and if it weren't for I school assignment, I wouldn't have wasted time and money reading this bilge.

"Their Eyes Were Watching God" is one of those so called "American classics" that I knew I should have read but I feared it was some overly self-indulgent, weepy Oprah book. Thankfully I did read it and it GREATLY exceeded my expectations. The story chronicles the life of a young black woman as she evolves from a confused teenager to a mature, confident woman. Her world is the poor, black towns of segregated Florida in the 1920s-1930s. Although she has a rather insular existence the author shows the reader the warmth, humor and lust for life these communities had. The pace of the story is rather prosaic with the exception of some serious drama towards the end. Yet strangely, the lack of pace is not a bother since "rhythm of life" captured by the author fully engages the reader.


Hopefully "Their Eyes Were Watching God" gains readership beyond African-American Literature 101 classes. A masterpiece? Perhaps not, but something special in its own right. Yet I also need to add that non-Americans might find the author's use of the local dialect to be incomprehensible or at least burdensome.

I wanted to love this book and I did in some parts. I enjoyed reading about life in the Dominican. The writing at some points was gorgeous. Didn't mind the Spanish phrases. It just sort of didn't go anywhere at the end, for me. It was a little long and not much of a payoff.

This funny/sad narrative of the family and friends of Dominican Oscar, an overweight sci-fi nerd, is a mixed bag of treasure. Each chapter is narrated by a different person in his life -- his sister, his mother, his college room mate, and of course himself -- and laced with Dominican history, to give insight into his "cursed" life. Parts are very touching, and other parts laugh out loud funny. Be warned though: if you are not bilingual or at least well-versed in Spanish, the book is heavily laced with spanish phrases that go unexplained (there is no glossary of terms -- maybe there should be). It is also filled with references to sci-fi and fantasy novels and role-playing games which may also be frustrating if you are unfamiliar with that genre. Still the characters are compelling and the stroy interesting. There is pleanty to enjoy -- just grab a contemporary Spanish-English dictionary and a Google the sci-fi references. :-)

I just finished reading about Oscar & his familia - real characters I know that I've met. Wonderful storytelling - weaving in DR history (that I didn't know) - and sending me to the Spanglish dictionary several times. Truly a great book!

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, was a very different kind of book for me. I enjoyed it very much, however, I found it very difficult as well. I attribute this to the fact that I had the audio version for this Pulitzer-Prize winner. There was a lot of use of Spanglish, and for someone without a Spanish background this was tough. The story itself was wonderful.

Told through the eyes of various narrators, readers enter the frightening world of a Dominican Republic family living in New Jersey. The characters' lives are overflowing with injustices, unrequited love, lost opportunities, physical cruelties, and as one narrator points out, an ancient Dominican curse called Fukú.

Oscar Wao, is a nice guy, who longs for love but he finds a lot of road blocks along the way: he's fat, a comic book, sci-fi, and fantasy nerd, and a loser. These undesirable characteristics diminish his chances of finding love. The love he so desperately craves, continues to elude him, and we witness the lengths Oscar is willing to endure just for the opportunity, however brief to feel love. Oscar is a poignant, painful, and lovable character who is in constant battle with his delusions. The female characters: Oscar's mother and sister, were very memorable as well. Their own brutal histories and sacrifices are heartbreaking.

I highly recommend this luminous, and humorous book, however, I would recommend the print version as opposed to the audio version, simply because of the English/Spanish difficulty I had.

Worst book I ever tried to read. Put it down in disgust after only 4 chapters. Lots of Spanish words not translated and huge boring footnotes trying to explain situations or references to people.

I had to read this book for my senior AP english class and I was quite stunned when I realized that I actually liked it. I like to read, but not usually the books the teachers assign, and the other two books she had assigned turned out to not be all that good. I liked a Raisin in the Sun because it had just the right mix of drama, and humor. Lorraine Hansberry really knows when the drama has become too much and she adds in a little bit of humor like any great author would. I really liked the characters, especially Beneathea who I found to be especially poignant and humorous. This book did not have a greatly detailed plot, but it made up for it in the way it was presented. It wasn't supposed to be an adventure novel, so I wasn't looking for a whole lot of plot twists. I also liked the message it sent.

It is a nice book. The characters personalities made the book good. If the characters were changed the book wouldn't be as good. The story shows the life of a black family in Chicago and their struggles through the years they lived there.

I found this a pretty boring book to read. Not particularly well written, but the overall story isn't bad. I really would recommend that you don't buy this book (get it from the library if you have to), but instead watch the dvd/video of the play (Danny Glover is hilarious in the lead role).

I found that this play was somewhat easy to read but definitely fits into the realism genre which I'm not really into so much. The story in mainly one about race relations but also has a large amount of insight on family dynamics. If someone is particularly interested in either topic they may very well enjoy this play much more than I did. The writing itself and character building was excellent, I just wasn't much for the topic.

Produced in 1959, A RAISIN IN THE SUN was the first Broadway play written by a black woman: Lorraine Hansberry (1930-1965), a memorable author who based the central story on an incident that occurred in her own family and which eventually evolved into a landmark Supreme Court ruling in 1940 as Hansberry v. Lee.

The play presents us with three generations of the Younger family: the widowed matriarch Lena; her son Walter Lee and daughter Beaneatha; and Walter's wife Ruth and their son Travis. The family resides in a semi-slum apartment building on the south side of Chicago in the 1950s, where each tries to rise above the difficulties of their enviroment and the many social limitations imposed upon African-Americans at that time. But there is hope on the horizon: Lena is about to receive insurance money from her husband's death.

Unfortunately, instead of pulling the family together, the money actually drives them apart. Each member lays claim to it in some form or fashion. Lena dreams of owning her own home; daughter Bea is attending medical school and needs money to finish her degree; and most especially Walter Lee dreams of owning a liquior store. Bit by bit the pressure chips away at the family, already strained by years of frustration, and explodes at the play's climax--although not precisely in a way that one might foresee. When the explosion arrives it does not shatter the family; it unexpectedly reaffirms it.

When I review a play, I like point out that plays are not really intended to be read. They are intended to be seen on stage, where performing artists and designers breathe life into the lines and bring force to the story and its themes. This is true of every play. It may be especially true of A Raisin In The Sun, which on paper feels somewhat dry and slightly preachy. But I have seen the play performed--and let me assure that you that it brings the audience to hysterical laughter, painful tears, a sense of deep outrage, and an affection for its characters that few other modern plays can match. It is indeed a brilliant work and a great classic of 20th century American theatre.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

"The Invisible Man" is a classic novel which uses the first person narrator, the invisible man, to move the reader through various types of racism, dishonesty, and deceptiveness which a black man in the 1950's would encounter. The more the invisible man is used by others, the more invisible he becomes and the less self-identity he possesses. He allows himself, unwittingly, to be used by others, both black and white, for their own purposes. He gains nothing from dealing with these characters and actually loses more and more of his self-worth, thus creating his invisibility as a person. It is only when he begins to realize that he must define his own self-worth and not allow others to dictate to him or define his identity that his "invisibility" begins to diminish. The idea that "white is right, white has might", symbolized by the paint factory, was the ideology of those times. Segregation was practiced and blacks were looked down upon as ignorant, nameless members of the American culture. They were invisible citizens in a white-dominated culture. The author wanted to send the message to readers that America was founded upon the philosophy of individual freedom in all areas and that nothing was gained by forcing people to conform to society's standards. By conforming, individual identity is lost and invisibility as a person increases. "I am not invisible that nobody can see me. I am invisible because they choose not to see me." That was the truth the invisible man finally learned. From that truth, he was able to begin defining his own identity and not be the invisible man in his own eyes.

This novel is a classic and a must read for any one, especially any American, of any color, race, or religion. Although it was written several decades ago, much of it still applies today.

Invisible Man / 0-679-73276-4

Ellison's master work is breathtaking, indescribable, and completely unique. This long and careful allegory of the young black man making his way through the white world is filled with passages so crammed with myth and meaning that the closest comparison I can make is to Rushdie's carefully disjointed Satanic Verses.

Simple incidents, such as Mr. Norton's introduction to Jim Trueblood are complex and fascinating. Trueblood has accidentally (or so he claims, - can we believe his impossible dream?) impregnated his own daughter, and now his daughter and wife are both pregnant at once. The lurid incident has resulted in Trueblood becoming a cause celebre for the white community - they hang on the lurid details, lap up the story again and again with prurient interest, and hold him up as justification for the doctrine of black inferiority.

Yet Mr. Norton's reaction to all this is a sort of disbelieving panic. He begs Trueblood to know why he is celebrated for this terrible thing, when others would be shunned. He takes great pity on the man, giving him monetary compensation for the horrible 'ordeal' he has been through. But something does not sit right, and Mr. Norton's interest seems very personal. He has mentioned that he had a daughter, and that something terrible had occurred to her. And we know that child molestation is not confined to the poor. Is it possible that...? And is Ellison suggesting that what a rich white man may hide, a poor black man cannot? Can we consider that what a rich white woman may chose to overlook, a poor black woman may not (as she has less money and social standing to 'lose' over the scandal)? Dare we wonder that a rich white girl can be sent away for private 'school' to bear a child in secret or get an abortion, when a poor black girl has only the option to shoulder on through the pregnancy?

It is the power of Invisible Man that these, and many other questions, are never answered - indeed, they are never even explicitly raised. But the nuanced narrative nudges them into our minds and, once there, we cannot let go of them.

This is book is far to good to be filed in one category, and unfortunately categorization is probably hurting the range of it's audience. What we have here is a great tome of African American literature to be sure, but the work far transends ethnicities in the importance of it's message and the social commentary found within. Granted it is about a young African American male trying to gain recognician as a man, if nothing else, in a society where identity [...] merely a fascade for social and professional purposes. This book is as well written and more developed than many of the existentialist literature spoon fed to us in school. I have to admit I felt a bit cheated that I stumbled on this book accidentally in the Black History section of a book store, sandwiched between Douglas and King.
Anyone who has opted to form their own opinions and maintain the integrity of their own values will find this a very satisfying read.

This novel seems to be just one big blurb that is trying to be expressed by as many words as possible. Things that could be summed up in a few words can take pages and pages to dictate. This makes the presentation awfully muddy and hard to follow.

At one point he's boxing , part of an explosion at a paint factory, has a lobotomy performed on himself, and so on and so forth to more ridiculous events that build on one another. This book just lacked any flow or pace since the events became even more outrageous, jumped around from one thing to the next, then used 10 pages too many to describe each event.

These flaws prevented me from realizing the themes the author was trying to cultivate. It seems that he wanted to make a book that encapsulated every walk of African-American life during this time period: college educated, field workers, those still under control of slavery, those under command of the whites, those in unions, those who work, those in Harlem, those in cities, those who are homeless, those who are crazy, those in organizations, those in the South. No wonder such a mountainous project did not come out coherently; the scope of it was too large to dictate successfully.

In the Reader's Guide at the back of my edition, Octavia Butler is reported to have said that she considers Kindred to be a "grim fantasy," not science fiction, as there is "absolutely no science in it." The mechanism by which Dana is "called" from 1976 to the early 1800s is never discussed. It simply is not relevant to this riveting story.

Through the story of Dana, a happily married woman, a successful author of 1976, suddenly and inexplicably thrown, repeatedly, back to a farm in the early 1800s in the slave state of Maryland, Butler examines slavery, the enslaved, and slavery's effects on all the people it touches: those born into slavery, Freedmen and -women returned to slavery, a Black woman from our own era who suddenly finds herself in a slavery-based society, a white man from our era also suddenly thrown into that same society, and those who "owned" other human beings - the slave owners.

She examines the choices slavery thrusts on each of these characters, too. Some of the most interesting parts of this story, to me, were Dana's agonized thoughts as her modern ideals and preconceptions were broken on the rocks of the horrors she saw all around her under the system of slavery. In some instances, she found that the reality of an impossible life made impossible (she thought) choices all-too-possible, for both herself and others.

Octavia Butler thoroughly researched this book by studying the Slave Narratives, first person "autobiographies of nineteenth-century Americans who lived as slaves," as well as other elements of the geography and culture of the era in which Kindred is set. Her meticulous research gives this book a stunning authenticity.

I read this book in one sitting. I literally could not put it down. I would recommend it to anyone.

Anyone interested in Kindred simply MUST read Toni Morrison's Beloved, in my opinion. Beloved is an even better book. Don't miss either one!

When I first looked at this book's details here at Amazon, I was put off by the fact that it is referred to in the category "books for girls." I was afraid it would be some kind of simplified "children's" book. Make no mistake: this is NOT a "children's book!" It is a thoroughly adult classic."

The only good thing I can say about this book is that Octavia has an interesting writing style and the story idea is creative. However, Octavia seems to think that if you are strong in these areas, you can be weak everywhere else. The first major flaw of this book is how extremely mawkish it is. For instance, there is a slave in the book named Tess. Now, Tess never had any speaking lines, so my brain came to referring to Tess as slave x because all the other slaves without speaking lines had no names, so why should Tess? Now, you can imagine how hard it is to make the reader care about slave x who has no speaking lines, so it took me completely by surprise when something bad happened to Tess and I was supposed to feel bad about it. Next, why don't you kill a character before they appear? Then, protagonist Dana spends some time moping over slave x and getting all worked up about it. However, the characters were so uninteresting that I wondered if Tess having a personality would make any difference. The most interesting character was the bad guy tom weylin, but octavia decided to ruin this by not deciding whether I should hate him or care for him before writing the book. This wasn't the only time she couldn't decide if I should hate someone or care for them. The character Alice was in a bad situation, so all too realistically she had Alice lash out at everyone around her. I hated Alice, but it seemed like Octavia wanted me to do differently despite making her a revolting character. Rufus weylin was pretty much a repeat of his father, being nice one second then abusing his slaves the other. The highly obnoxious margaret weylin became a sweet old lady in her old age, freed of racism and with the ability to no longer annoy everyone. This wasn't just with caring about characters, but protagonist dana would switch from being a compassionate pushover to being overly assertive. That's just an example. The story only gets worse as it goes, as nothing new really happens. Slaves are mistreated I GET IT ALREADY! Pretty much every part after the fourth part was redundant. The ending itself was highly disappointing, even for such a bad book. The only reason I can think of to buy this book is if you've never read a book about slavery before. Indeed, the treatment of slaves is accurate to the point that anyone who likes historical fiction will be outrageously bored because that's all their is in the story. No exciting plot twists, no deep characters, what else do I need to say?

I just finished Kindred and was inspired more by the character development and slave narrative than the fantastic aspect of the text. I think Butler handled the historical situation more effectively than she did the actual situation of time travel. I was expecting to be drawn more than I was into the ramifications of the protagonist's time traveling on her present-day life.

I agree that about half-way through the story became a bit too predictable, but I never lost interest, because Butler never slowed the text's pace.

I can't say that I was riveted by the book, but I read it in afternoon, so I mustn't have been bored either. I would recommend the book for high school students specifically. (I am a teacher and I think the book would be one students would be interested in.)

Ms. Butler combines the slave narrative with conventions of science fiction in this novel. Dana is a black woman living in the late 1970's with her white husband Kevin. She is transported back in time to the 1800's in order to save the life of her white, slaveholder ancestor. Once, Kevin is transported with her. She spends quite a bit of time in this period and is treated as a slave. Her 20th century upbringing and sensibilities quail at this and she tries to affect some change, at times with disastrous results. She is forever changed, both physically and mentally by this experience.
While I am quite used to stories of time travel, the slave narrative is new to me. This book was loaned to me by my African American co-worker when she found out I liked science fiction. I would imagine this book reads more like a slave narrative than science fiction, as the time travel is just a device to place the protagonist in this setting. Her experiences are heartbreaking, and remind us that it wasn't too terribly long ago that people of African decent were treated as less than human.

Unfortunately, this inspired writer recently died. I encourage ALL to review her works. This novel was my introduction to Octavia E. Butler, and I would advise any enthusiasts of speculative and science fiction to investigate it, and her multiple works!

William Faulkner compels his readers to think, and sometimes to think mightily. This is one of his books that underscores mightily. The reader will be richly rewarded in availing himself of this masterpiece.

The Sound and the Fury / 0-679-73224-1

Difficult and complex, The Sound and the Fury details the slow decline of the American South through the metaphor of the fictional Compson family. This book is so complex and rewarding because Faulkner introduces the concept of the unreliable narrator - the book is alternately narrated by three brothers, one mentally retarded, another depressed and suicidal, and the third arrogant, cruel, and vicious. Because of this, our impressions of the Compson family (and of the pivotal sister, Caddy, who is never given her own voice) must emerge from these flawed narratives, attempting to find common ground between all three, and realizing that even this common ground is suspect.

Is sister Caddy a sweet, noble girl, an angel who cares for her mentally retarded brother and eases his troubled passage through childhood? Or is she a promiscuous, wanton young woman who commits incest with her suicidal older brother because he wants desperately to share her "shame" with her, in an attempt to save her? Or is she a stupid, easily manipulated woman, who is tricked by her cruel younger brother into giving him guardianship of her daughter and sending "support" money for her which he then steals for himself? In the end, we suspect that Caddy is none of these things, and is simply a woman, with all the complex motives and neuroses that plague her brothers. It is, in a way, a shame that Caddy - as the lynchpin of the Compson family - is not given a voice of her own, but we also understand that we would not be able to trust her any more than the mental ramblings and confused remembrances of her brothers.

It's difficult to point to a more complex and tragically beautiful American novel than Faulkner's 'The Sound and the Fury.' Composed with a kind of crazed inspiration, Faulkner traces the decline and ruin of the Compson family from the point of view of four of its members, the severely disabled Benjy, the self-destructive Quentin, and the resigned Jason. Dilsey, the African-American servant to the Compsons, remains one of the richest and most truly felt of all literary characters. This novel is extremely difficult in form; Faulkner's subtle use of first-person stream of consciousness narration and nonlinear chronology is both baffling and fascinating. Additionally, his removed 'appendix' after the completion of the narrative is as modern as anything that has been printed in the last thirty years. Presented as a tragic vision through a blurry bottle, 'The Sound and the Fury' will continue to haunt and perplex for as long as it is read and studied. A true masterpiece.

The Sound and the Fury, Faulkner's novel about the decline of a Southern family, has been enthroned in the pantheon of English literature, primarily because of Faulkner's use of stream of consciousness.

By beginning with the mentally-retarded Benjy as narrator, Faulkner assures that the reader has virtually no idea what's going on (other than that Caddy smells like trees) for the first quarter of the book. Quentin's section isn't much better. In both cases, Faulkner jumps around chronologically with no regard for the reader. Faulkner makes it worse by giving each section a date, which in Benjy's and Quentin's cases only makes it more confusing, since he doesn't adhere to it at all.

Is this stream of consciousness realistic? That's hard to say. Certainly not for everyone. Even if it is, so what? It's frustrating, and it isn't particularly interesting. Even if one grants that Faulkner has masterfully displayed the way the human mind works, so what?

What Faulkner does well is emotions. This novel is filled with powerful displays of emotion, which Faulkner does an excellent job of showing rather than telling. As such the second half of the novel, which is for the most part straightforward and linear, is quite compelling.

So why is this novel considered so great? Because it's so challenging and difficult? It's much easier to defend The Sound and the Fury as a literary exercise than as a novel, as half of it is all but incoherent. Certainly it isn't a novel for casual reading. There is some very worthwhile writing here, but for many readers, it just isn't worth it.

As I Lay Dying had piqued my appetite for Faulkner so when I saw the Sound and the Fury on our school reading list, I couldn't wait. I decided to read it on my own before we read it in class. The first section was a different reading experience than I have ever had. It was more like a puzzle than a typical novel. Benjy jumps around in time without telling us where he is going so it is very disorienting and frustrating for a while. The frustration the first time through just adds to the enjoyment you get the second, third, or fourth time through when you have a much clearer picture of what is going on. I would encourage you to try and figure what is happening out on your own, break out some scratch paper and try to follow Benjy's muddled time line. I did that and then got online to find resources and check my work against theirs. It adds to the experience when you do it on your own without constantly SparkNoting it. Benjy's section was good, but Quentin's section was the best reading experience I have had. It could never be done with a movie. By the end of the section, I felt like I knew Quentin unlike any other character I have ever seen on TV, movies or read about in books. Quentin's section gets deep inside of you and affected me profoundly. When I finished the book the first time, it was an accomplishment. The second and third times were more enjoyable. The text is so packed with stuff that repeated re-readings enhance the enjoyment of this book. For any person who wants to enjoy literature, you should give The Sound and the Fury a try. Forget all about grammar, conventional plot lines, and linear story progression and just enjoy learning about these characters.

PS Don't worry so much about the plot, focus on the characters. Characters are primary and plot secondary.

It had some writing in it, but overall a good deal for the price. Thanks

87 years after the Declaration of Independence, the Emancipation Proclamation was enacted and after the the ratification of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution Enslaved Americans gained thier freedom.

Before the civil war Abolitionist were the Advocates of change in America the struggle to gain ones freedom from the experiences of slavery in the south is told from the true experiences of Fredrick Douglass. From Slavery to the Struggle for freedom to escape is the story told here, but also the story of survival to activism in the Abolitionist movement to change America.

During the nearly 100 years after the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of 1787 Black America finally found Freedom, But between Slavery and Freedom was the struggle of the freedom fighters of the Revolutionary Abolitinist Movement to bring slavery in America to an end. This is the story of the virtues of a victim of Slavery turned into a revolutionary success story, This is the story of Fredrick Douglass.

As a political junkie, I watch several news and commentary television shows. On the day that Barack Obama was declared the nominee of the Democratic Party for the presidency of the United States, black journalist Eugene Robinson was speaking. He said that we should all stop for a minute and appreciate the significance of this event. In the early 1960's black people had a very difficult time voting and in the southern United States, whites who killed blacks were generally acquitted if brought to trial. Now, there is the very real chance that a black person will be the next president.
One of the greatest assets Obama has is his incredible gift for speech and communication. He is extremely articulate and is capable of delivering his words in a manner that resonates. I was privileged to attend one of his rallies and was even able to ask him a question.
When blacks were slaves, they were property, nothing more. If their owner was dissatisfied, they could whip or even kill their slaves with impunity. Therefore, to truly appreciate and understand how far things have come in the United States, it is necessary to read some of the descriptions of how slaves were treated.
This is one of the best accounts of the horrors of slavery ever written. Douglass was one of the first articulate blacks to appeal to whites. He was even the vice presidential candidate of the Equal Rights Party in 1872. The presidential candidate was Victoria Woodhull, the first woman to run for president of the United States.
Douglass describes the brutal and indiscriminant treatment that a slave was forced to endure. When a slave showed any sign of independence, the goal of the white supremacists was to break them by any means necessary. Mothers and fathers were separated from their children, food was withheld and physical mistreatment were all weapons in the arsenal of the slave-breaker.
In this moment of the triumph of racial equality, it is an excellent look back to read the writings of Douglass. It gives you a perspective on how truly historic the nomination of Barack Obama is and will continue to be.

The Narrative is another book, like Hiroshima, that ever person should read. The in-depth look into Douglass' life shows how slaves were treated during the 19th Century. It explains why the struggle for freedom that led to the American Civil War and why it was such a brutal confrontation.

"I expose slavery in this country, because to expose it is to kill it. Slavery is one of those monsters of darkness to whom the light of truth is death." Frederic Douglass

Frederic Douglass tells us the REAL story about slavery in early America. From the first page to the last, I was totally transfixed. There are so many things to admire about this great American. On top of being brilliant and brave and benevolent and broad-minded, etc... what I truly admire about this amazing soul was the fact that he is able to tell us his story sans bitterness. For let me tell you, if the majority of us had to endure one iota of what this man went through... Let's just say that those saccharine sweet saga's like "Gone with the Wind" left a few pertinent things out!

This is one hell of a powerful story! The brutalities of slavery will disgust you, but to see this beautiful soul rise above it all is something special. He is the most important figure in nineteenth-century black American literature and a man that merits more attention than he gets. This is a magnificient achievement, an important work of art.

Very highly recommended!

I was extremely disappointed in SULA, I had to force myself to read the entire book. I found it to be very boring.

Toni Morrison writes so well it just flows out, but the horror it leads to is both disturbing and unexpected.

Written in 1973, Toni Morrison's second novel explores themes of life, love, sex, and death, contrasting Sula Peace and Nel Wright, best friends from childhood who grow up to lead totally different adult lives. Living in the Bottom, an ironically named, poverty-stricken black community in the hills of Medallion, Ohio, Sula and Nel, opposites in personality, share their thoughts, feelings, and secrets, some of them of life-and-death importance. Part of a family with a long history of violence, Sula believes she owes nothing to anyone except herself, while Nel's strict mother imposes limits and insists on her adherence to social values.

Though Sula eventually escapes the Bottom in the 1920s to attend college and travel from Georgia to California, Michigan to Louisiana, she always does what is expedient, having no real values or ambitions, other than her own pleasure. When Sula returns to the Bottom in 1937, the stable Nel is a wife and mother trying to keep her family fed and clothed, a woman who no longer has anything in common with Sula, though she becomes Sula's innocent victim. Morrison develops Sula's character through her dysfunctional relationships and selfish actions, showing her connections to her family's past but never blaming it for her later abhorrent behavior.

The novel is a series of cycles and follows a circular structure, opening in 1965, as whites decide they want the Bottom land for golf courses and hilltop views and the blacks who have always lived there move to the valley with its more fertile land. The cyclical nature of life is also borne out in the lives of the characters, especially that of Sula, who escapes Bottom but returns inevitably to the community of her mother and grandmother. Racial segregation, accepted as a given, underlies all facets of the novel, but Morrison focuses on character here, avoiding polemics and creating a novel which manages to be tough but often darkly humorous, emotionally sensitive but often brutal, compassionate but realistic about human nature.

Rich with imagery and symbolism, the novel is also accessible and involving. Morrison creates characters with whom the reader identifies, even in Sula, who is a less than sympathetic protagonist; Shadrack, the shell-shocked war veteran who opens and closes the novel, wrings the heart even as he lives a life of absurdity. Filled with irony, intricate in structure, and well-developed in its themes, Sula is less complex than some of Morrison's later novels, but satisfying in its vividly drawn view of a struggling black community unified in its poverty. n Mary Whipple

Song of Solomon
Beloved
JazzThe Fiction Of Toni Morrison: Reading and Writing on Race, Culture, and IdentityConversations With Toni Morrison (Literary Conversations Series)

I have read a lot of books, but this has to be one of the worst that I have ever read! I found it to be terribly slow and very hard to get interested in, not to mention that there are several parts that are downright offensive. Don't waste your time, there is much better reading out there!

Morrison's writing style is unique and demanding - and most readers like it like that.

"Sula" is a simple story about complicated people which Morrison paints in terribly artful language. It is drama, it is insightful prose, and it is a great reading novel.

Bad versus good are the constant theme. Sula is theoretically bad. And, the starched personalities of the town in which they live, Medallion, are the good. But, at the very end, Sula's once best friend has an epiphany and seems to recognize that Sula is not bad, and that other's perceptions of her were wrong, terribly wrong. But, Sula is selfish. Most of the others are anything but. And, that divide creates many of the problems, and more.

Selfishness includes getting something others cannot obtain. Sula gets an education. Sula gets to travel. Sula gets her grandmother's money and does not need to work. Sula gets her grandmother's home - large. Her life is easy. She has it all. And, the others cannot see her doing anything constructive with it. And they are right. In fact, she can be outright destructive - but not necessarily by ill will. She is just too self absorbed.

Each chapter commences with a year - indicating the calendar year of the growth of the girls - Sula and Nel, Sula's best friend who later has the inconceivable violation by Sula separate them for the rest of their lives. Before their 1910 birth, we learn something about their respective parents and Sula's maniacal grandmother. And, along the way Medallion's other "far out" characters like Shadrack (whose eccentric January 3 annual suicide celebration reminds me of the strange idiosyncracies displayed by people of John Berendt's "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil"(Modern Library)).

But, as you turn pages of this book, you learn these uncommon people in the common town of Medallion are people you would love to learn and learn to love. People like these characters are the bedrock of America.

Like Morrison's novels, this book includes more eye-opening accounts of the white man's cruelty to man with behavior that people today find hard to believe was countenanced by our forefathers. For example: trains had no bathrooms for blacks so they had to run to fields at certain stops and use leaves for paper; no blacks of Medallion were hired for construction which was located at their town; black people who ran through white cars would be threatened to be "red lighted" by conductors; black men would be arrested and beaten for matters which caused white women to commit torts upon other white women (car accident caused by jaywalker); and a drowned boy who floated down river would not be returned for three days because whites would not carry his corpse back the two miles until a ferry was available.

Depressing is something which is not uncommon in Morrison's novels, but being black in the wrong time in America's history may be more the cause of this result than Morrison's style or focus. And, the topics she addresses are serious topics which deserve to be aired, deserve to be read, and are honored to be written about by someone of her literary acclaim.

This is a very good book by a Nobel laureate - it is a must read.