Reviews for The Homecoming

The average rating for The Homecoming based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-08-09 00:00:00 William Monk "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." This book is really quite sad. The characters are weighed down with such misery and heartache as they shoulder the burden of nearly unbearable memories. These memories are carried within the women of this story and are passed through the generations where they persist and wreak havoc on the psyches of both mothers and daughters. Sophie has been raised in Haiti by her Tante Atie for the first twelve years of her life. Sophie’s mother, carrying a shame she could not bear, fled to New York to escape a past that haunts her. Sophie has led a reasonably happy life for a child living in a poor country rife with political unrest and violence. "We come from a place, where in one instant, you can lose your father and all your other dreams." When her mother finally sends for Sophie, Sophie does not want to leave but has no choice. She does not know this mother and she will be leaving behind the one she has always thought of as her mother. Not only that, she is also faced with the challenges of immigrating to a foreign country. "My mother said it was important that I learn English quickly. Otherwise, the American students would make fun of me or, even worse, beat me." Sophie will need to adapt quickly, and learn about her mother and her mother’s demons that torment her dreams each night. But when pain begets further pain in a relentless cycle, Sophie will need to return to her roots to discover the truth and begin the slow process of healing. What I loved most about Breath, Eyes, Memory were some of the lyrical descriptions of Haiti and its people. Danticat does this so well. The bonds between women – sisters, mothers, daughters, grandmothers – are also explored and are fascinating, complex and often heartbreaking. Certain traditions that are passed on are simply shocking and perplexing. What I found to be lacking in this novel, however, was a feeling of connection to any of these women. The dialogue felt abrupt and distant. The closeness I expected to feel with these women was just not there; although I did feel compassion for them in general. There were some big jumps in time that may have caused the character development to suffer. The sense of a cohesive plot was missing at times as well. In some ways, aside from the very heavy and unsettling topics within these pages, I got the sense this was more like a YA novel. Not that I’d recommend this to a young adult because I personally would not. Perhaps it was the relatively young age of the author at the time this was written that came through to me. Nevertheless, she is still to be applauded for taking on these tough themes and I do think she has much to offer. I enjoyed The Farming of Bones more than this and would recommend that if you have not yet read anything by Edwidge Danticat. This one gets 2.5 stars rounded up.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-06-01 00:00:00 Alexander Drinda “The tale is not a tale unless I tell. Let the words bring wings to our feet.” - Edwidge Danticat, “Breath, Eyes, Memory.” My first read for Black History Month, “Breath, Eyes, Memory” is Edwidge Danticat’s first novel and I loved it. This writer introduced me to Haitian literature over a decade ago and I feel strong feelings of kinship with her. This was a beautiful and moving story about a young Haitian girl named Sophia, whose mother leaves her with an aunt in Haiti as a baby and moves to New York to escape bad memories and get a better life for herself. When Sophia is finally reunited with her mother at the age of 12, she is a girl wise beyond her years, trying to navigate herself in an unfamiliar environment, using a strange language, with a mother she doesn’t really know: “Night had just fallen. Lights glowed everywhere. A long string of cars sped along the highway, each like a single diamond on a very long bracelet.” I was struck by that description. How would the busy streets of NYC look to a young girl freshly arrived from the Third World? I’ve heard far too many stories of families separated by immigration. We hear about families reuniting but rarely do we hear about the difficulties they face trying to re-adapt to each other and make up for lost time. Danticat brings these issues to the forefront. Despite depicting some of Haiti’s violent history, it was a hopeful book, one infused with Haitian thought and mentality, mostly through stories, songs and the grandmother’s wisdom, the grandmother, who like mine, has been preparing for her own funeral for years. The part about the grandmother definitely touched me; it hit very close to home. The descriptions of Haiti were evocative; it felt like Danticat was drawing from her own memories there: “The mid-morning sky looked like an old quilt, with long bands of red and indigo stretching their way past drifting clouds. Like everything else, eventually even the rainbows disappeared.” I know this book will speak a lot to a lot of immigrants, especially those who question where home is. Being stuck between two worlds as well as experiencing the generation gap is a double whammy for many immigrant kids. Old practices continue to take place in their new home; however, with a new westernized mentality it can all be hard to take. The unbelievable stress a young immigrant faces having to live up to high expectations, after all their family sacrificed so much for them to have a better life is something that is a real issue: “If you make something of yourself in life, we will all succeed. You can raise our heads.” Reading this made me dwell on how much the world is changing. My first language is different from my mother’s and my grandparents’, I can’t even communicate with some of my relatives because we don’t have a language in common. My relatives are spread out all across the globe. Changes beget changes and questions about identity and the value of tradition abound.