Hi all,
The Coldest Winter Ever is one of my all time favorite books and Sister Souljah one of my favorite authors. I have read Winter and No Disrespect more than once and was looking forward to "Midnight", her latest book.
Well, I got a hard cover of "Midnight" as a Christmas gift today and boy I couldn't wait to crack it open and get started.
Souljah's writing of course, is very good and the narration flawless.
But there's one thing... the character I so liked and was described so perfectly in Coldest Winter Ever that I was chasing him with the story's protagnist, hoping she would eventually find him and the right path... changed. I'm only eleven pages in and I already dislike Midnight.
What happened?
The book opens with Midnight describing his origins as an immigrant to America, the tenets of his cultural upbringing and some of the Muslim teachings that shaped him into a man. This is all fine and dandy but Midnight comes across as PIOUS. He describes his not being born in America as an advantage and lords his "cultural advantages" over American blacks, as though we are born waste.
I liked Midnight in the first book. The Midnight I imagined was born in Brooklyn, a drug dealer working for Winter's father. How could I admire a person like that, you may ask? I assumed being born without advantages, without a father, that he was ripe for a life of crime. But instead of allowing his disadvantages to ruin what was inside of him, he not only prevailed as a man (by getting out) but manages to hang on to his integrity.
I can respect a man who lives around crooks and killers but somehow maintains dignity and pride in himself as opposed to a man who boasts a perfect upbringing, intellectual father, and superior "African" culture but somehow degrades himself by becoming a drug dealer. That to me is something I find reprehensible. But of course he blames, all in a span of the first ten pages, his descent into a life of crime on "being around American blacks".
This is so preachy, pious, and hypocritical that it takes me out of the story. Not only that, it insults its readers. My heavens I am an American black and heaven knows I consider myself a virtuous woman. I don't need Islam or a man to lord over me to teach me that.
So what is Sista Souljah trying to say? The message in Coldest Winter Ever came across loud and clear. She did it without preaching to her audience, without scathing articles on how degraded the American black woman/black male is compared to African/Muslim society that Midnight boasts, "kills their women" for bringing dishonor to the family.
Instead, she glorified the fast life in the "Coldest Winter Ever" then left us facing the cold harsh reality of that lifestyle at the end of the book. Very effective.
This is much too pious, but her writing is very good. I hope I am not too hasty in my comments, as I am only on page eleven. I will give the book a chance, for now but only because I like Sista Souljah and am willing to see where she's going with this.
Posted By:
Friday, December 26th 2008 at 1:29AM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...
