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Dramatic,
Informative,
Interesting

4 reviews

Breath, Eyes, Memory (Oprah's Book Club)
by Edwidge Danticat

Published: 1998-05-31
Paperback : 368 pages
5 members reading this now
9 clubs reading this now
7 members have read this book
Recommended to book clubs by 3 of 4 members
At an astonishingly young age, Edwidge Danticat has become one of our most celebrated new novelists, a writer who evokes the wonder, terror, and heartache of her native Haiti--and the enduring strength of Haiti's women--with a vibrant imagery and narrative grace that bear witness to her ...
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Introduction

At an astonishingly young age, Edwidge Danticat has become one of our most celebrated new novelists, a writer who evokes the wonder, terror, and heartache of her native Haiti--and the enduring strength of Haiti's women--with a vibrant imagery and narrative grace that bear witness to her people's suffering and courage.� � 

At the age of twelve, Sophie Caco is sent from her impoverished village of Croix-des-Rosets to New York, to be reunited with a mother she barely remembers. There she discovers secrets that no child should ever know, and a legacy of shame that can be healed only when she returns to Haiti--to the women who first reared her. What ensues is a passionate journey through a landscape charged with the supernatural and scarred by political violence, in a novel that bears witness to the traditions, suffering, and wisdom of an entire people.

Editorial Review

Oprah Book Club® Selection, May 1998: "I come from a place where breath, eyes and memory are one, a place from which you carry your past like the hair on your head. Where women return to their children as butterflies or as tears in the eyes of the statues that their daughters pray to." The place is Haiti and the speaker is Sophie, the heroine of Edwidge Danticat's novel, "Breath, Eyes, Memory." Like her protagonist, Danticat is also Haitian; like her, she was raised in Haiti by an aunt until she came to the United States at age 12. Indeed, in her short stories, Danticat has often drawn on her background to fund her fiction, and she continues to do so in her debut novel.

The story begins in Haiti, on Mother's Day, when young Sophie discovers that she is about to leave the only home she has ever known with her Tante Atie in Croix-des-Rosets, Haiti, to go live with her mother in New York City. These early chapters in Haiti are lovely, subtly evoking the tender, painful relationship between the motherless child and the childless woman who feels honor bound to guard the natural mother's rights to the girl's affections above her own. Presented with a Mother's Day card, Tante Atie responds: "'It is for a mother, your mother.' She motioned me away with a wave of her hand. 'When it is Aunt's Day, you can make me one.'" Danticat also uses these pages to limn a vibrant portrait of life in Haiti from the cups of ginger tea and baskets of cassava bread served at community potlucks to the folk tales of a "people in Guinea who carry the sky on their heads."

With Sophie's transition from a fairly happy existence with her aunt and grandmother in rural Haiti to life in New York with a mother she has never seen, Danticat's roots as a short-story writer become more evident; "Breath, Eyes, Memory" begins to read more like a collection of connected stories than a seamlessly evolved novel. In a couple of short chapters, Sophie arrives in New York, meets her mother, makes the acquaintance of her mother's new boyfriend, Marc, and discovers that she was the product of a rape when her mother was a teenager in Haiti. The novel then jumps several years ahead to Sophie's graduation from high school and her infatuation with an older man who lives next door. Unfortunately, this is also the point in the novel where Danticat begins to lay her themes on with a trowel instead of a brush: Sophie's mother becomes obsessed with protecting her daughter's virginity, going so far as to administer physical "tests" on a regular basis--testing which leads eventually to a rift in their relationship and to Sophie's struggle with her own sexuality. Soon the litany of victimization is flying thick and fast: female genital mutilation, incest, rape, frigidity, breast cancer, and abortion are the issues that arise in the final third of the novel, eventually drowning both fine writing and perceptive characterization under a deluge of angst.

Still, there is much to admire about "Breath, Eyes, Memory," and if at times the plot becomes overheated, Danticat's lyrical, vivid prose offers some real delight. If nothing else, this novel is sure to entice readers to look for Danticat's short stories--and possibly to sample other fiction from the West Indies as well. --Alix Wilber

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Member Reviews

Overall rating:
 
 
  "Gripping"by Toni B. (see profile) 06/23/11

This book is very dramatic, and envelopes you right into what it is like to be a young girl in Haiti. After reading the first two thirds of the book, I really wanted to know what kind of life Sophie would... (read more)

 
  "Breath, Eyes, Memory"by Kathleen R. (see profile) 03/12/11

 
  "Opens our eyes..."by Kea H. (see profile) 01/18/11

...to the realities of tens of thousands of others. Gets us out of our comfort zone. Goes far beyond the little we receive in sound bites.

 
  "Emotionless writing, lack of character development left us with nothing to discuss"by Jennifer H. (see profile) 10/19/09

A Haittian girl travels to live with her mother in New York after being raised by her aunt in her native land. The story had the potential to be fascinating. Unfortunately this story is written with absolutely... (read more)

 
  "A girls childhood in Haiti and then New York seriously effects her life"by Christy G. (see profile) 11/20/08

Very enjoyable, easy read, tough subject area.

 
  "This is a quick read because the author tells the story with the limited vocabulary of an immigrant, but it is a powerful story."by Cynthia W. (see profile) 09/11/08

It was enlightening to learn more about the struggles that a Haitian child faces in this country and how the new culture impacts generations differently.

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