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notesbynnenna 's review for:
The Coldest Winter Ever
by Sister Souljah
Thank you to the publisher for giving me a free copy of this book! All opinions are my own.
Normally as I’m reading a book, I have some sense of what I’ll want to mention in my review, but this book has me a bit stumped. Guys, it was wild. So let me just say that I don’t have any nostalgia around this book. I know a lot of people read it when they were teens, but I’d actually never heard of it until recently. Was it entertaining? Yes, definitely. I almost wish I had my reactions on video because I was making all kinds of faces when reading this book. Was it difficult to read at times because of the sexist and problematic comments made by some of the characters in the book? Also, yes.
The main character, Winter, is selfish and manipulative. The only people she cares about are herself and her family, but mostly herself. She’s flawed and difficult to like, but she’s still the center of this story, and there’s power in that. I feel like the author was trying to tell a story about a young Black girl growing up in the hood, and I appreciated that. And given how popular it was, it seems like many people connected with that aspect of the story.
So I don’t quite know how to feel about this book. I imagine I would have felt differently if I had read this book when I was younger, but reading it as an adult, I thought it was an entertaining story, but also felt like a product of its time.
Normally as I’m reading a book, I have some sense of what I’ll want to mention in my review, but this book has me a bit stumped. Guys, it was wild. So let me just say that I don’t have any nostalgia around this book. I know a lot of people read it when they were teens, but I’d actually never heard of it until recently. Was it entertaining? Yes, definitely. I almost wish I had my reactions on video because I was making all kinds of faces when reading this book. Was it difficult to read at times because of the sexist and problematic comments made by some of the characters in the book? Also, yes.
The main character, Winter, is selfish and manipulative. The only people she cares about are herself and her family, but mostly herself. She’s flawed and difficult to like, but she’s still the center of this story, and there’s power in that. I feel like the author was trying to tell a story about a young Black girl growing up in the hood, and I appreciated that. And given how popular it was, it seems like many people connected with that aspect of the story.
So I don’t quite know how to feel about this book. I imagine I would have felt differently if I had read this book when I was younger, but reading it as an adult, I thought it was an entertaining story, but also felt like a product of its time.