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Challenges: ARC Reading Challenge, New Author Challenge
… she worried whether Katy was normal and totally adjusted. Did she laugh enough? Was she too introspective? To serious?
She’d obviously had fun digging the clams, so she was clearly capable of joy; she just didn’t jump up and down and let herself go wild very often. Was that bad?…
How do you ever know as a mother? There are landmines everywhere, waiting to blow up in your face. Am I too strict? Not strict enough? Should I tell Henry, for example, that he really has to stop swearing in front of her or is that being overprotective and silly? Will Katy be sitting in a shrink’soffice some day, blaming me fo everything wrong in her life? Will she make the same mistakes I did?
Tainted by Brooke Morgan is about a young single mother, Holly Barrett, who has always been the wallflower and shy friend of the more gregarious Anna. Holly got pregnant with Katy the first, and only, time she had sex and the father, Anna’s ex, ran as fast and far away as he could. Two years after Katy’s birth, Holly’s parents died within days of each other, leaving Holly with a sense that the world is full of pain and she has virtually no control in it. Henry, her 75-year-old grandfather, Anna, Katy and the Cape Cod house that had been her summer home growing up is her entire world.
Enter Jack Dane. Tall, handsome and English, Jack is “faintworthy” and Holly is quickly swept away by his charm and he provides her with a sense of safety; he fast becomes a part of every aspect of her life. He, too, has lost both of his parents. By all appearances, Jack is Mr. Perfect. But is he really this good? Or is he keeping dark and dangerous secrets? Is he really Prince Charming? or a monster in disguise?
Tainted by Brooke Morgan is a slow cooker and an unassuming book. I really like how Morgan has really captured the sensitivity and worries of the “dating” single mom, and that of worry-worry-worry that goes along with motherhood (sometimes I wonder if worry is the force that drives our engines as mothers!). I also love Henry, Holly’s grandfather, who reminds me of a few grizzled souls whom I love dearly. Not one to want to be called “Gramps” because it made him seem infantile and incapable, nor “Grandfather” because it made him seem ancient, he’s always went by just “Henry” but hasn’t lost the effect of his role as a grandparent by this choice.
Confession time: I haven’t finished this book yet, but I fell in love with it after the second or third chapter. I’d have to say that Holly is my literary twin, and I can completely relate to her. Jack is still Mr. Perfect where I’m at in the book but, to tell you the truth, he has a really Dexter-feel to him. The dog didn’t like him, and I’m waiting for him to go on some murderous rampage. Or bodies to turn up, at least. He’s too nice, and people who are always nice are creepy and are hiding something. It pulls me along and I hafta-HAFTA read the next page.. the next chapter… and before I know it, 50 pages have gone by.
Of course, since I haven’t finished it yet, I’ll reserve rating it for now, but I’m definitely loving it 🙂
If you’d like to check out other reviews, here’s a list of fellow tour hosts:
I don’t have nothing to write today – maybe never. Hammer in my heart now, beating me, I feel like my blood a giant river swell up inside me and I’m drwoning. My head all dark inside. Feel like giant river I never cross in front me now. Ms Rain say, You not writing Precious. I say I drownin’ in river. She don’t look me like I’m crazy but say, If you just sit there the river gonna rise up drown you! Writing could be the boat carry you to the other side. One time in your journal you told me you had never really told your story. I think telling your story git you over that river Precious.
I still don’t move. She say, “Write.” I tell her, “I am tired. Fuck you!” I scream, “You don’t know nuffin’ what I been through!” I scream at Ms Rain. I never do that before. Class look shock. I feel embarrass, stupid; sit down, I’m made a fool of myself on top of everthing else. “Open your notebook Precious.” “I’m tired,” I says. She says, “I know you are but you can’t stop now Preciuos, you gotta push.” And I do.
–Push by Sapphire, pages 96-97
wow. I mean really, WOW.
Push by Sapphire is a book of truth. It is raw, heart-breaking, and hard. It is inspiring, hope-filled, naked and honest. It is not the kind of book that will appeal to everyone, not that happy beach book many want, it is stark and dark and real and beautiful. It could’ve been exploitative, could’ve been depressing and hopeless, could’ve so easily become an anti-white, anti-men rant, but Sapphire managed to weave the story together, as told by the main character, Precious Jones, into an emotional tale of how education can give hope for a chance at freedom and a better life.
I knew a bit about the story from the movie based on the book, Precious. I haven’t yet seen the movie (are you kidding? There’s no way the theater owner of our little 2-screener would’ve had THAT movie in HIS place! Heck, he wouldn’t bring in a Tyler Perry movie, and they’re funny with a little “let’s get real” on the side), so I have to way until it comes out on DVD next month (already in my Netflix queue), but I have seen the trailers and watched the interviews and heard the awards buzz about it. From the few scenes I’ve seen, and after reading the book, the movie should win every award it could qualify for, and if it doesn’t, I’ll be irate. I also knew about this book from seeing it being checked out… always out and never in… at the library, and from reading Kathy at Bermudaonion’s review back in December.
So when I wandered (drifted mindlessly, to be more accurate) to the book section at Walmart the day before yesterday and saw it on the shelf, it was in my cart before Maggie could say, “No more books, MOM!” Now, my policy for buying new books at full price is that it HAS to be a book I will read immediately. Not next month or next year, but this week or sooner. I was already several pages into Push before I left the store, and finished a little more than 24 hours after buying it. Push is the kind of book that, as soon as you put it down, you pick it back up and start reading again, forgetting why you’d put it down in the first place. The kind of book you forget to eat because it’s so engrossing. I could barely go to the bathroom, and would worry and wonder what was going on with Precious while I was gone from her. It will, without a doubt, be one of my top 10 books of 2010, and on my favorites list forever.
Okay, so enough gushing…. Let’s deal with the book itself.
One of the first things I got out of Push, was the realization of what it was, exactly, that I’d hated about The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine. Both Precious and Batuk narrate their respective stories through writing in a journal. Both books deal with the loss of innocence, sexual abuse, the sacrifice of the child by a parent, animosity between mother and daughter, and that education is the only hope and chance of escape. But where they differ greatly is in the voice of the narrator. Precious is pissed. She’s upset, emotional, and expresses her sense of injustice at the terrible hand life has dealt her. WHY? is her question over and over. And understandably so; you expect these feelings. Batuk, on the other hand, falls flat. She’s accepting of her situation, barely registers emotion, occassionally expresses that she misses her father (the same man who sold her) and waxes nostalgic for the past. Aarti of B O O K L U S T tweeted that she felt Batuk was a strong character, but I never saw any strength in her. I do, however, agree that the overall voice of The Blue Notebook was despair and hoplessness, as Batuk knew she could never escape the situation.
Another thing I can tell you, with personal authority, is that the feelings and experiences Precious expresses from the standpoint of being an incest survivor is very real and very true. There are things that Precious says about the sex with her father that are difficult for a child to wrap their own head around, let alone have the courage to say outloud, even in a journal. Things like the shame you feel at feeling physical pleasure during this situation that you know in every fiber of your being is WRONG. It’s one of the things that totally screws up the person’s ability to relate sexually for the rest of their life. Also, Precious’s reference to genitals, hers as well as others, reflects how deeply incest survivors view their own objectification as a sex object. “I am of no value nor worthy of love except through sex.” is the personal worth statement of many, no matter how long it’s been since the last occurance (it’s been over 10 years for me, and he’s now dead, and yet it still that thought pervades), and the longer the abuse went on, the more pervasive and rooted that feeling becomes.
Besides the sensitive subject of molestation and the emotional affectation of the book, there is also the racial side of things. This is where my brain spent more time, because it’s the only part I don’t share with Precious (well, that and I didn’t have children by my abuser). I would say, “I hope I don’t offend anyone,” but then would holding back in an attempt to be non-offensive honor my Flavor of the Week, Amy, or create dialogue? No, it would not. So let the offense commence!
This review may become my longest ever (except The Book Thief, and may surpass that and the companion post), but I don’t care. It deserves the length and the discussion. Let’s get real, as Dr. Phil says.
Precious has a poster on her wall of the famous leader of The Nation of Islam, and often refers to him as the only real man she knows. One of his sentiments that she echos more than once is, “problem is not crack but the cracker” (page 83). I will heartily admit there are far more white people who have put their feet on the back of the neck of blacks throughout history than have helped, but maybe I’m naive in hoping things are better now than before. I grew up in with a racist father who told offensive jokes and used the N word often, though he was not as bad as a lot of my friends parents. It’s the way things were then. It should NOT have been, and it was wrong, but it was what it was. I’ve done my best to free myself from all that biggotry and to unlearn the prejudice, but it’s still something I’m aware of. My hope is that my children will never think multiculturalism an oddity, but that it comes as natural to them as sunshine and breathing.
As the story progresses, Ms Rain, Precious’s teacher, shows her that not ALL Farrakhan’s ideas are right, like his anti-semitism and anti-homosexual beliefs, and Precious understands and sees her point. She still hangs on to him as an inspiration and hero, citing him in her poem at the end of the book “Get up off your knees, Farrakhan say”, which I think is maturity in anyone. As I’ve gotten older, read more, and learned more, there’s one thing I’ve come to understand about people. We want a quick and easy, singular answer. Life is anything but that, though, and no one person has the answers to everything, nor is he or she right all the time. You have to sift and take away what’s worthy and leave the rest. Most of the people you glean from aren’t good or bad, but a mixture of the two, and we must see their humanity and avoid the temptation to adulation or hate.
Other moments in the book that show the sense of distrust and dislike of whites are things like Precious’s feelings in the school counselor’s office, or the social worker’s office in the halfway house. Precious, as well as the others in her class, express distrust, fear, and blame the white people in charge of her case. This, I think, is the sentiment that sticks in my heart and throat as I try to wrap my head around it and put myself in her shoes. Everywhere Precious would turn, there is a white wall blocking her escape. No one stepped in to take her out of the situation after her first baby was born. Who stood up to help her learn to read? Where was the teacher when Precious was having such emotional problems (other kids in the class, her mother’s abuse at home, and the main start of the sexual abuse) in the second grade that she was wetting her pants? Ugh! I can understand the blame and anger she feels toward whites, and it breaks my heart to know I myself, my kids included, are judged the same, though we would NOT be like that.
And maybe it’s that that makes the racism in this book painful. I’m being judged by the color of my skin, too, and it isn’t fair – it is never fair. And with that thought, I have to bump Push by Sapphire up another notch, because reading it has given me a glimpse at what it feels like for African-Americans all the time, and they can’t close their book at “The End”. They live it all the time, while I get to go back to being white in a white world.
I really love this book and, but for the explicit language and the mature subject matter, think it should be read by everyone. Okay, so it’s not likely to be a classroom read for a high school, but definitely a college study. I wish I’d known about it when I was in college, I could’ve had another 13 years of mulling it over and letting it work through me. Of course, obviously, I give Push by Sapphire5 out of 5 stars.
Here is the author Sapphire in an interview with Katie Couric discussing the journey of the book Push to the movie Precious
And, I couldn’t resist a trailer for the movie.. k, now I’m weepy.
Tainted by Brooke Morgan
The Triumph of Deborah by Eva Etzioni-Halevy
Strange But True America: Weird Tales from All 50 States by John Hafnor
Red Letters by Tom Davis
Dragon House by John Shors
Book reviews, entertaining and humorous posts, as well as memes and giveaways, In the Shadow of Mt. TBR is a fun and informative place to relax in the shade!
Title: Tainted
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