From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun

Rating:
Summary: A Different Point of View
Review: This book started with explaining what this boy Melanin Sunwrote in his notebooks about. Basically it explained that he was shyand wrote down whatever he wanted to say when he was too shy to. Inhis notebook he also wrote down pretty much his whole life, or what he could remember of it at least. As the book goes on you follow his thoughts and feelings of his life and begin to feel the fear and sadness and hate along with him. In first part of the book it talks about why his mother named him Melanin Sun. She was young when she had Mel (Melanin) and the father went off and never talked to her or located her again. Mel grew up trying to be a normal kid in a neighborhood of all African Americans. He didn't think much of white people really. He mostly thought they were all rude to blacks. Mel was now thirteen going on fourteen. His mother sees other men and is working to become a lawyer. It's the summer and Mel and his friends, Ralph and Sean, hang out a lot. Mel's crush Angie gave Mel her phone number but he still hasn't called because he's afraid he won't know what to say to her. At this age Mel is very emotional and expresses his feelings about everything so well in his notebook. But his whole life is about to change in one trip home from the beach. His mom EC pulls the car over and says to her son," I'm in love with Kristen." Mel just met Kristen the night before. He didn't like her too much because she was white. Mel was in total shock. He didn't want anyone in his neighborhood to know about this. He was so angry at his mother for ruining his life like this that their close relationship faded quickly. They never talked again for a very long time. Angie finally got the nerve to call Mel instead of her waiting for him. Mel definitely didn't want her to know about his mom. But one night Sean saw Mel's mom and Kristen together not acting like just friend's. Sean blurted it out in front of everyone. Mel and Sean got in a fight and Ralph called Mel after a couple of weeks and said that everyone in town knew. Ralph was cool about it but Sean's mother said he couldn't hang out with Mel anymore. After that I don't know if Angie and Mel ever talked again. Finally Mel and his mom spoke. She told him to give Kristen a chance because Mel hardly knew her. He thought the whole idea of Kristen and his mom was just wrong but he couldn't change EC's mind about it. So the next day Kristen, Mel, and EC went to the beach to try and get to know each other better. It's now up to you to find out whether Mel separates from his mom because of what she's doing, or if he continues to love his mom because she's his mom.