Reading during the school year... (Part 1)

To kick off the summer, I thought I would post about some books I read over the course of the school year that stuck with me.

Over Thanksgiving break, I read Emma Donahue's Frog Music. Having read Room (now a major motion picture) several years ago and crying through it (yes, I have tear ducts), I was excited to read Donahue's follow-up.

While I was ready for realistic fiction, I had forgotten that this novel was historical fiction--and, in fact, very well-researched historical fiction based on a true story!

The Washington Post review by Ron Charles does a great justice to the book, but it dances around some of the graphic material....and this is not for those who feel they can't handle mature content (it is about a prostitute...a real one, not a Hollywood glamorization). Looking at this novel from a feminist perspective is interesting, as it seems in the beginning that Blanche is an empowered woman, only to see how impossible empowerment was for women at that time, given the constraints on what they could wear and even what they could own (for, if a woman was married, all that she had automatically became her husband's!).

Women are at the core of this story, and this novel takes an interesting look not only at women, but at a moment in time. Mature content aside, I found the portrayal of San Fransisco fascinating, especially as I had read about early California in Isabel Allende's Daughter of Fortune last summer. This seemed to me almost a sequel, with issues of sexual exploitation, racism, and violence recurring...as well as the pursuit of love. I won't spoil too much of this (in part because the content is so mature), but the following trailer provides an interesting preview of the story.

Over Winter Break, I read Trevor Noah's Born a Crime, a memoir of growing up in South Africa. I have to confess that before reading this book, I really wasn't all that interested in Trevor Noah. As far as I was concerned, he was that poor replacement for Jon Stewart on The Daily Show. However, after reading this book, I had a newfound respect for the man and his sense of humor.

Then, my father picked up the book, and said that it was providing him with a really interesting perspective on apartheid. I have to admit, that I didn't know that much about apartheid before reading the book, but I was eager to learn more. The book interestingly begins with the actual law surrounding black and white breeding and intermarriage, showing not only how severe the penalties were for a romance of mixed races, but also showing that those penalties were less severe for white people than for black people.

 What I found very interesting was the fact that Trevor Noah was in fact born a crime. If his mother had shown that she had a half race son, the state would have taken him away and send him to live in an orphanage, because people of different races couldn't live together. And just one example of his mother's ingenuity, she used to have a mixed race friend go walking with them in the park, so she could pretend she was the nanny, and not Trevor's mother. If someone had suspected that the friend wasn't Trevor's mother, they wouldn't be arrested.

Aside from providing an interesting look at apartheid, this book is relatable to anyone who has felt like an outsider, and shows how creative people can be when they are looking to make their way in an unjust world. This book also really highlighted the strength of Noah's mother, who we know from the outset is shot in the face  by her husband, and yet survives, waking up to tell a joke as her first words. 

 Additionally, there are funny anecdotes that show how we in the Western World can think singularly about certain issues. For example, one that really stuck with me, was a friend of his called Hitler. Noah points out that people often named their children for famous figures, and given that black people in South Africa weren't often educated, they didn't really understand why Hitler might be an offensive name, so when Trevor and his friend Hitler went to a Jewish school, well, you can imagine....

And as you can imagine, I read several other books during the school year, but those will wait for another day!