Rating: 
Summary: Finally, Not Another Chicklet Book
Review: 3.5 stars. :) This booked looked interesting and didn't seem like another typical "chicklet" book (a la bridget jones's diary). It took me a while to get into the story though. Although I can identify with Crita's (main character) background, there was something about her speech and attitude that wasn't jibing for me. The book picked up for me when the main character moved back home and interacted with her family. Still, there were many times when I didn't LIKE Crita. I think it was just frustrating to see how she had enabled her brother for sooooo many years. It was like, "alright already!" I loved the sister Hazel and might have enjoyed the story more from her perspective. All in all, I think Sophronia Scott's book was well done. What did it for me was the careful weaving of each family member's personality -- showing how they grew from childhood to adults and all the influences that made them who they are. It was very insightful. Looking forward to the next book.
Rating: 
Summary: A wonderful book made better by meeting the author
Review: A great read. The author joined our book club to discuss the book and brought even further insight into her inspirations and how they influence her writing. She is an extraordinary woman whose warmth comes through in her writing and her storytelling. We had lively discussion concerning the characters she created and how they came into being as well as the themes of family throughout the novel.If you can, invite Sophronia to your book club and share this book with its creator.
Rating:
Summary: Keeper of the House
Review: ALL I NEED TO GET BY by Sophfronia Scott is a very emotional look into the lives of family members affected by a sibling's drug abuse. Crystal "Crita" Carter is the second oldest child of four who currently lives in Harlem as a successful owner and operator of an accounting business. When called home to deal with her father's illness she is confronted with her past or with what she thought was her past. Lincoln Carter is the eldest child and only son of the Carter family; a former corporate employee, former high school and college track star and all-around charmer, his life has been ravaged by the usage of drugs. Finally there is Demetrius "Tree" Templeton, a schoolteacher and Crita's former lover. These two men hold the key to Crita's heart and her psych and returning home only ignites her passion and fury of the past from which she ran. For Crita and Linc family loyalty always came first but at a cost; a cost that Crita could not comprehend but Tree could see coming.
Set in the small town of Lorain, Ohio, ALL I NEED TO GET BY also delves into the musings and anger of other important characters and their behaviors of the past and present when presented with Linc's illness. How each person copes is drastically different. Ella, the third oldest living in Virginia, escaped as a child by making herself pretty and staying away from the home as much as possible by dating a slew of suitors. Hazel, the youngest and current college student, sets a dangerous plan in motion so the family can rid themselves of Linc once and for all. As a child she chose to ignore Linc as if he did not exist. Chandra, Linc's wife and their daughter Savannah, has a stake in Linc's life and we are treated to those effects. Chandra has a past with the drug abuse issue, a past which she refuses to repeat. The story weaves back and forth between the past and present and also utilizes dream sequences that make for a very complete story filled with pain and anguish but also hope and determination among the characters.
The delivery is superb with the use of metaphors and imagery that could rival the best. The demonstrative impact that a loved one's drug usage has on his significant others is awesome making Sophfronia Scott a literary force to be seriously reckoned with. ALL I NEED TO GET BY is an excellent debut novel by an excellent storyteller.
Reviewed by Dawn R. Reeves
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers
Rating:
Summary: Keeper of the House
Review: ALL I NEED TO GET BY by Sophfronia Scott is a very emotional look into the lives of family members affected by a sibling's drug abuse. Crystal "Crita" Carter is the second oldest child of four who currently lives in Harlem as a successful owner and operator of an accounting business. When called home to deal with her father's illness she is confronted with her past or with what she thought was her past. Lincoln Carter is the eldest child and only son of the Carter family; a former corporate employee, former high school and college track star and all-around charmer, his life has been ravaged by the usage of drugs. Finally there is Demetrius "Tree" Templeton, a schoolteacher and Crita's former lover. These two men hold the key to Crita's heart and her psych and returning home only ignites her passion and fury of the past from which she ran. For Crita and Linc family loyalty always came first but at a cost; a cost that Crita could not comprehend but Tree could see coming.
Set in the small town of Lorain, Ohio, ALL I NEED TO GET BY also delves into the musings and anger of other important characters and their behaviors of the past and present when presented with Linc's illness. How each person copes is drastically different. Ella, the third oldest living in Virginia, escaped as a child by making herself pretty and staying away from the home as much as possible by dating a slew of suitors. Hazel, the youngest and current college student, sets a dangerous plan in motion so the family can rid themselves of Linc once and for all. As a child she chose to ignore Linc as if he did not exist. Chandra, Linc's wife and their daughter Savannah, has a stake in Linc's life and we are treated to those effects. Chandra has a past with the drug abuse issue, a past which she refuses to repeat. The story weaves back and forth between the past and present and also utilizes dream sequences that make for a very complete story filled with pain and anguish but also hope and determination among the characters.
The delivery is superb with the use of metaphors and imagery that could rival the best. The demonstrative impact that a loved one's drug usage has on his significant others is awesome making Sophfronia Scott a literary force to be seriously reckoned with. ALL I NEED TO GET BY is an excellent debut novel by an excellent storyteller.
Reviewed by Dawn R. Reeves
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written, toooo loooong...
Review: All I Need To Get By follows Crita Carter and her struggles to overcome decisions she made in the past to enable her brother's drug addiction. Sophronia Scott handles issues such as addiction, family loyalty, and health crisis with sensitivity and compassion, but I thought the story was about one hundred pages too long and the main character, Crita was so imature that I wanted to back hand her. Most of the character portrayals were realistic (except Talane), but I didn't think they were hard enough on Linc. I loved Chandra and wished she had been more aggressive. As strong as the three sisters were, they shrank like little whimp girls when dealing with their brother, reverting to children at the mere mention of his name.
Scott is a talented writer and I look forward to future works. I'll probably check them out on audio though. The story took too long to make its point about Crita and Linc's situation. I was relieved when I turned the last page.
Rating:
Summary: A fresh voice -- on an under-treated topic
Review: How much do we owe our families -- and how much do we owe ourselves? These are the central questions at the core of the beautifully written All I Need To Get By. And after reading the book, it truly is striking to realize just how few contemporary novels recognize that most of us do feel that our families are more than merely a sum of its parts. These intangible links, so hard to break, form our characters and mould the way we interact with the world. To discuss the premise is to be drawn into revealing the plot, so let me keep it simple: this is a book that will stay with you long after you close the book. The characters feel so real, it is as though they are friends of friends. Their struggles are not easily-solved, movie-of-the-week difficulties, but honest-to-goodness real-world Gordian knots: drug use, co-dependency, mortality, learned helplessness, deep-down rage, and fear. And yet, out of this morass of human struggle, Crita's dogged determination to make her little corner of the world better transforms this novel ultimately into an uplifting story. In short, this is a novel well worth reading, on a topic that has long deserved serious consideration. Sophfronia Scott is an author well worth watching in the future.
Rating:
Summary: A fresh voice -- on an under-treated topic
Review: How much do we owe our families -- and how much do we owe ourselves? These are the central questions at the core of the beautifully written All I Need To Get By. And after reading the book, it truly is striking to realize just how few contemporary novels recognize that most of us do feel that our families are more than merely a sum of its parts. These intangible links, so hard to break, form our characters and mould the way we interact with the world. To discuss the premise is to be drawn into revealing the plot, so let me keep it simple: this is a book that will stay with you long after you close the book. The characters feel so real, it is as though they are friends of friends. Their struggles are not easily-solved, movie-of-the-week difficulties, but honest-to-goodness real-world Gordian knots: drug use, co-dependency, mortality, learned helplessness, deep-down rage, and fear. And yet, out of this morass of human struggle, Crita's dogged determination to make her little corner of the world better transforms this novel ultimately into an uplifting story. In short, this is a novel well worth reading, on a topic that has long deserved serious consideration. Sophfronia Scott is an author well worth watching in the future.
Rating:
Summary: Like a sweet and morning dew
Review: How sweet it is to have family. The title told me that this book was going to be about the typical black author writing about love relationships. With entirely too many novels written on relationships, it almost makes me regret that Terry McMillan is the culprit of this craze. YAINTGB is a light toned novel that have the potential, with better dialogue, to be moving.
Rating:
Summary: Like a sweet and morning dew
Review: How sweet it is to have family. The title told me that this book was going to be about the typical black author writing about love relationships. With entirely too many novels written on relationships, it almost makes me regret that Terry McMillan is the culprit of this craze. YAINTGB is a light toned novel that have the potential, with better dialogue, to be moving.
Rating: 
Summary: Your family is your family, no matter what
Review: I was ready to read yet another African-American novel with the same formula - I need a man, I have a gay best friend. Thankfully 'All I need to get by' followed it's own formula. Yes we have a little bit of New York in this novel but the majority of it takes place in Ohio. Many authors forget that there is a whole population that doesn't reside in New York and L.A. Sophfronia Scott makes the Carter family a family we want to know. The conversations between mother daughter, sister brother, sister sister, father daughter, father son make you understand this family in a way that makes put off reading that last page. The flashbacks were well placed throughout the book. I absolutely loved this book and the way the author gave the story to us straight....no fluff here. Mwabi
Mahogany Book Club
Lexington, KY
|
