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A review by courtneyajw
Claire of the Sea Light by Edwidge Danticat
4.0
As a teenage, Edwidge Dannicat was one of my favorite authors. I must have read [b:Breath, Eyes, Memory|5186|Breath, Eyes, Memory |Edwidge Danticat|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1401207512s/5186.jpg|459447] and [b:The Dew Breaker|31116|The Dew Breaker|Edwidge Danticat|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388240903s/31116.jpg|2901] a hundred times each. [b:Claire of the Sea Light|16280051|Claire of the Sea Light|Edwidge Danticat|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1367256761s/16280051.jpg|22381420] reminds me of what I love so much about her writing style, her stories and her characters. Danticat writes with a delicacy that is rare now. Her stories are never over written, there is no long, heavy prose to follow for pages on end without punctuation. The writing is sweet and light. The story tells itself, the characters let us learn about them slowly and gradually. There's no dump of description of emotion even when a revelation comes suddenly.
This is the story of a small village by the sea - Ville Rose. The inhabitants range from the destitute and poor like Claire and her father Nozias, to the wealthy like the school owner Max Ardin Senior and his son Max Ardin Junior. All of the characters are linked together in various ways and depend on each other in other ways. Claire has spent the seven short years of her life trying to get to know who her mother was and her father has spent the same time mourning his dead wife and attempting to give Claire a better life by giving her away. There is the sad story of rape and the child produced by it. A scorned woman who has little to combat her former lover who wields a masculine hand to make her life difficult and humiliate her. It's the story of death - falling prey to the gangs and easy pay off of the police. Surviving loss. Attempting to prove that men are men above all.
The intertwined stories are all sad and uplifting at the same time. I would definitely recommend this and anything else by Danticat.
This is the story of a small village by the sea - Ville Rose. The inhabitants range from the destitute and poor like Claire and her father Nozias, to the wealthy like the school owner Max Ardin Senior and his son Max Ardin Junior. All of the characters are linked together in various ways and depend on each other in other ways. Claire has spent the seven short years of her life trying to get to know who her mother was and her father has spent the same time mourning his dead wife and attempting to give Claire a better life by giving her away. There is the sad story of rape and the child produced by it. A scorned woman who has little to combat her former lover who wields a masculine hand to make her life difficult and humiliate her. It's the story of death - falling prey to the gangs and easy pay off of the police. Surviving loss. Attempting to prove that men are men above all.
The intertwined stories are all sad and uplifting at the same time. I would definitely recommend this and anything else by Danticat.