Keep The Faith: A Memoir Book

I was prepared not to like this book. I couldn't even remember how it had gotten on my list of books-to-read. All I knew of Faith Evans was that she was the widow of Notorious B.I.G. and that she was caught cheating on him with Tupac.

I'll admit that at first it was really hard not to want to judge this woman. For the first half of the book I found myself rolling my eyes every time she patted herself on the back or made some reference to how good she was at something, how she was destined for greatness, how smart she was, how naïve she was. She mentions her world-famous lasagna about four times or so throughout the book. I don't think I've ever heard her sing, but according to her, her voice is enough to make everyone in a room stop what they are doing and just listen in awe. All this is said in bewilderment as if she is completely unaware of how great she truly is.

She talks about smoking weed like she's drinking a can of soda. It bothered me to read how she did this during one of her pregnancies and then justifies it by saying she was stressed out and she consulted a Jamaican old lady to see if this was harmful to her baby. She is in love with a man who is constantly cheating on her and who whenever she confronts him about it, he straight out tells her, 'yeah, I did it' and then they end up having hot sex after every confrontation. She ends up going to several of these women's houses and beating the heck out of them. This man cheats on her so many times, yet she still goes and gets his name tattooed on her chest. Why? To make matters worse, she justifies her own cheating ways because of how this man cheats on her.

As for the technical aspect of the book, there were several things I found annoying throughout. Some of the dialogue was terrible. Conversations were recreated using slang. By the time I finished this book, I don't think I could even say the word 'alright' correctly anymore. Did it really have to be spelled as 'aiight' in order to give it flavor? Several times I felt like she was talking to the reader as if they were stupid by pointing out obvious things, or giving definitions of words, or by reminding the reader how she already mentioned something earlier on in the story. This is done in a style of 'Remember when I said earlier in the book that…'or 'I think I remember saying that…' such as when she is reminding the reader of how she falls in love hard and fast throughout all the romances she mentions in the book, how she is rash of thought, what her favorite diamond store is, what her favorite Chinese takeout place is.

But I must admit that there was a lot of drama in Faith's life and eventually she won me over. Sometimes life hits you hard and she was hit hard. She not only had to deal with the murder of her husband, but all the negativity that surrounded her because of her relationship to him, the accusations of infidelity with Tupac, the alienation from Bad Boy Records. Several friends betrayed her. ( Shame on you Mary J. Blige for your actions at the funeral. )

I don't know that Faith wrapped up this memoir by telling us what she learned from that period of her life. Maybe it's not necessary for her to do so. But I do wonder what her kids will make of some of the stories mentioned in here, such as the promiscuity, the cheating, the quick solution of abortion anytime you don't want to deal with the consequences of unprotected sex, and the open drug use, without some kind of 'Don't try this at home' warning. I have to give her credit though for her honesty and for baring her soul knowing she would probably be judged harshly (I tried not to, I really did. Let's just say I got more of an understanding for her.) Maybe if Faith had chosen a different fork in the road of her life we would have instead gotten an inspiring memoir about how she won a full-paid scholarship to a top college and how she didn't drop out to choose a life of crime and drugs and revelry. For all her choices in life though, this is who she is. All the things she has gone through she has seemed to emerge a strong woman and I hope she continues on a path of success and happiness.