Breath, Eyes, Memory

Rating:
Summary: Truly moving and empowering book
Review: I really enjoyed Ms. Danticat's "Breath, Eyes, Memory". She conveys in an amazingly simple and clear way a profound message about the complex struggles many women face. Ms. Danticat skillfully puts into words feelings and thoughts I have always had but never verbalized.

Rating:
Summary: This book really hits it to a daughter point of view.
Review: This book really shows how mothers can upset the life of thier daughters, even when they don't even know that they are doing it. For my school i was told to read about and author and by accident i found Danticat. I feel it was a good find. But this book is very interesting and i find that it touches many hearts. My only problem with is book is that it makes a hard thesis, and report, thee are so many themes i wish i could just find one. I give i 10 stars and think that Danticat's other book Krick Krak is also an award winner. I give her much respect, and hope the next one is as great as these two.

Rating:
Summary: Heart wrenching and yet beautifully told
Review: This book can connect with any woman at any point in her life. The connection between a mother and a duaghter is never smooth sailing. The relationship in this story is one of distrust,anger,resentment, and yet there is the undying love of a mother that comes through in all these emotions. Only a mother's love can cause a daughter to feel resentment and love at the same time towardse the same person.

Rating:
Summary: A very light read
Review: While I felt that the plot was pretty decent, the characters were not fully developed. We never learned the true motivations for Tante Atie. Nor did we get a true look into the Mother's nightmares. I think character development is a problem because we are looking at the story from the main character's point of view. However, I believe that Arthur Golden did a much better job with "Memoirs of a Geisha". With "Memoirs" Golden's character showed tremendous insight, while with "Breath, Eyes, Memory" we are just getting a very distant view of the characters.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and colorful in its rich cultural descriptions
Review: In Breath,Eyes,Memory, Edwidge Danticat drags you into a rich world of century old Haitian culture, the only world that little Sophie Caco has ever known. Sophie is sent from her tropical haven in Haiti to the United States to reunite with her original birth mother. In Breath,Eyes,Memory, two contrasting worlds and women come together as one through their common Haitian heritage. I found that this book contained beautifully written phrases and very descriptive sensory images.

Rating:
Summary: So?
Review: This book portraited an all too familiar childhood upbring for some of us as women. The bond with a close family member over your mother, the dysfunctional "'shaking of the finger' to keep your dress down and your panties up" warning towards our virginity and sexuality from mothers, aunts, and grandmothers, the painful memories of sexual assaults from relatives, neighbors, friends, strangers and people in authority, and dealing with death. There were too many gaps, sporadic jumping between story lines that the ending was a 'thud'.

Rating:
Summary: Touching and again, a realization of the trama women endure.
Review: This book was sweet, touching and so very real. Once again, we see how childhood "issues" can do such harm. Read it, laugh, cry and applaud all women, hear us roar!

Rating:
Summary: A touching novel that really gets to your heart.
Review: I would easily give this wonderful book 5 stars, because of all the drama, and the auther puts a picture in your mind like you're really there. She also gives all the details, like, ..."an old yellow car with the paint half off..." and ..."the spring stuck into my right thigh, but I didn't move..." My favorite character was of course the main character,Sopie. She describes everything so vivedly, like the horrible memories she had as a child. I would definately recommend this touching book to any young adult reader. It may be a little boring in the first 2 chapters, but after that you can't put the book down.

Rating:
Summary: has very little relevance for students of european politics
Review: Although in many ways this is a fine book, I have to warn the potential buyer that it ignores many of the important issues associated with european integration. Some material on the institutional balance of ecosoc and the court of auditors would have been helpful. All told, a thoughtful and cogent study but if you are only going to buy one book about the enormous changes sweeping europe I would not recommend this sadly unfocused title.

Rating:
Summary: Struggle to break free of hampering traditions.
Review: Breath- the present situation one must deal with. Eyes- Ability to peere into the future through what one has been through. Memory- past experiences, pleasent or not, a person must deal with. A beautiful account of growing up and finding oneself through hardship and personal choice. Reminded me of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. When Sophie moves from Haiti to live with her mom, in her mind however, her Aunt in Haiti is her true mom, she finds her self falling for a musician that lives next door. Her mother notices and puts her through the family tradition of testing. This is the act of finding about the purity of one's daughter by putting fingers into her privates, testing to see if she is virgin. This process ruins Sophies self esteem, she decides to fake her loss of virginity, apon which the mother kicks her out of the house. The testing is an ugly tradition that has hampered the women of Sophie's family for generations. The testing causes fear of intemacy, seen in her aunts preference of women and alcohol over men. The testing causes Sophie to seek help psycologically in the form of group therapy with other sexually abused women, all of whom were the victims of traditions that were meant to keep women pure in the eyes of the family and for the men of their society. Her mom( whose name I can not recall), becomes pregnant. Memories of her rape at the hands of her father, where the seed for Sophies birth was planted, and of the testing, both of which left her unable to deal with adversity in life, forced her to make the decition of suicide over abortion. This is how her pain was subsided. Danticat explores the realms of human suffereing at the hands of traditions that let not an individual see into the future or look apon the present, because past experiences are too overwhelming to be forgotten. There is terrific symbolism and immagry throughout the book. A fast read, I completed it in one sitting, that will have readers feeling the pain that these women feel. It will force you to think about your own traditions, and evaluat the merit that they carry. Personality and self respect is shaped in accordance with every action and trial that a person is subjected to. If these trials and actions harm the thin fabric of personal worth, they are a hinderence to survival, mentally, physically and spiritually.