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923 reviews for:
The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After
Clemantine Wamariya, Elizabeth Weil
4.25 AVERAGE
923 reviews for:
The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After
Clemantine Wamariya, Elizabeth Weil
4.25 AVERAGE
informative
reflective
fast-paced
challenging
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
This book demonstrated so clearly emotional themes I have seen play out in the lives of loved ones in my life who are refugees from Rwanda. The themes were particularly relevant for those who are still young adults. I wish I had read it years ago. If someday Clemantine Wamariya decides to write another memoir reflecting on the decades of her life still to come, I will read it eagerly.
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
emotional
medium-paced
"There’s a difference between story and experience. Experience is the whole mess, all that actually happened; a story is the pieces you string together, what you make of it, a guide to your own existence."
A very difficult but very important memoir of a young woman who, as a child and with her older sister, traveled through multiple refugee camps throughout several countries in Africa during the Rwanda Genocide. Clemantine, her sister Claire, and Claire's children are eventually granted refugee status and move to the United States where they must learn to reassemble their lives after years of turmoil and resiliency.
A very difficult but very important memoir of a young woman who, as a child and with her older sister, traveled through multiple refugee camps throughout several countries in Africa during the Rwanda Genocide. Clemantine, her sister Claire, and Claire's children are eventually granted refugee status and move to the United States where they must learn to reassemble their lives after years of turmoil and resiliency.
challenging
dark
informative
inspiring
tense
medium-paced
Loved this. So interesting. A really intimate memoir where the author unpacks her childhood as a survivor of the Rwandan genocide and her process of adaption and culture shock when she moved to America and what it means to survive not only such horror but how it changes the lens in which you view everything around you and the relations with others. I did struggle at the beginning with the fact that it jumped back and forth between her time in Africa and her time in America (which was maybe more jarring b/c I did the audiobook). I LOVED the ending of the narration where the author herself speaks about the process of writing this memoir.
I also found the language beautiful.
"I’m excited for you to feel everything, every word. And for you to be aware that every word in this text matters, yes, and when you feel it, you feel which words that will heal, which words that hurt, and also which words that helps us evolve."
I also found the language beautiful.
"I’m excited for you to feel everything, every word. And for you to be aware that every word in this text matters, yes, and when you feel it, you feel which words that will heal, which words that hurt, and also which words that helps us evolve."
I would have preferred Clemantine to read the audiobook herself. She speaks at the end of it, and it transforms the text. Robin Miles is an eloquent speaker, but this book didn't need to be read in such a clean manner.
I always feel terrible rating memoirs because I feel like I'm rating their life. That's not the case. I'm rating how they told their story. I didn't know much about the Rwandan genocide and felt she needed to include some background. Additionally, I felt the writing was mediocre and disjointing because of all the time jumps. I found the actual story of her leaving Rwanda and everything that happens quite compelling. But at the end she focuses a lot of her PTSD, anger, and speaking engagements which I was less interested in, especially because it seemed chaotically put together. Overall, it was illuminating but I could probably find something more informative than this book.
This is a very powerful story, one that is worth telling and certainly worth listening to. The writing is very sensitive and beautiful, even though the subject is so terrible. It's very toucinhg to see somebody lay their hearts open for the world to see like this young woman did.
My only criticism about this is the editing/pacing, and it's something I'm not sure was entirely the author's doing or if it was an editor's interference. Either way, I felt sometimes the changea between places and times too abrupt and that sadly, it took some of the strenght of the carefully chosen words and constructed paragraphs. I understand the idea behind trying to tell everything in fragments, in tiny beads, I just think maybe the order of things got a little messy. But nonetheless, this is a great book, and it's worth reading.
My only criticism about this is the editing/pacing, and it's something I'm not sure was entirely the author's doing or if it was an editor's interference. Either way, I felt sometimes the changea between places and times too abrupt and that sadly, it took some of the strenght of the carefully chosen words and constructed paragraphs. I understand the idea behind trying to tell everything in fragments, in tiny beads, I just think maybe the order of things got a little messy. But nonetheless, this is a great book, and it's worth reading.
Oh, my god. I knew I wanted to read this book the second I got the ARC of it. I can't believe it took me this long to read it. I mean, is it possible to give a book a hundred stars? A thousand? A million?
I want to say that Clemantine and her sister, Claire, deserve so much, but that would be antithetical to Wamariya's experiences: who is she to have come from so little and now have so much? Why her? Why does she deserve this more than others? Really, she doesn't deserve more than anyone else in her position just because she knew how to survive better than them.
UGH THIS BOOK WAS SO GOOD. Wamariya is so evocative and a masterful storyteller--the true horror being that this was indeed her life, as well as so many others. She's careful in what she shares, careful about her rage and anger and upset. She weaves in stories and experiences and the frustrations and wants and needs of her as a six year old to her as a freshman. She must reconcile her privileged hardships alongside the times in which she lived as a refugee, in which her sister married a refugee worker as a means to escape, in which she's lost and alone and has nobody to reach out to.
It's evocative, provocative, chilling, terrifying, reclamative, truthful, honest. It's everything a memoir should be, and a reminder of everything that shouldn't be. Do yourself a favor and read this book. It takes no prisoners, and you will be glad for it.
Review cross-listed here!
I want to say that Clemantine and her sister, Claire, deserve so much, but that would be antithetical to Wamariya's experiences: who is she to have come from so little and now have so much? Why her? Why does she deserve this more than others? Really, she doesn't deserve more than anyone else in her position just because she knew how to survive better than them.
UGH THIS BOOK WAS SO GOOD. Wamariya is so evocative and a masterful storyteller--the true horror being that this was indeed her life, as well as so many others. She's careful in what she shares, careful about her rage and anger and upset. She weaves in stories and experiences and the frustrations and wants and needs of her as a six year old to her as a freshman. She must reconcile her privileged hardships alongside the times in which she lived as a refugee, in which her sister married a refugee worker as a means to escape, in which she's lost and alone and has nobody to reach out to.
It's evocative, provocative, chilling, terrifying, reclamative, truthful, honest. It's everything a memoir should be, and a reminder of everything that shouldn't be. Do yourself a favor and read this book. It takes no prisoners, and you will be glad for it.
Review cross-listed here!