Tag: poor

Potentially Good And Running Rich Or Poor

“Without the reliable narcotic drip of an education to remind me how special I was…my self-worth became unstable and indeterminate.”

“You have so much potential.”

Killer Potential is about a tutor and a woman she goes on the run with. Evie tutors students for the SAT and her clients are rich. They are the wealthy with huge mansions and money to spare. One day she enters the house of a student and discovers that the parents are dead and it looks like murder. As she was just about to head out, she hears the whimpering pleas asking for help. She discovers a woman tied up in a closet and frees her. As they were about to leave, they were spotted and now they are on the run. They are suspects. They are fugitives trying to evade capture. Evie is now famous but will she find the real killer in time?

I liked the opening chapter of this book and the discussion of grammar. I love grammar and English. It was delightful to start off this way, with the discussion of passive and active voice which set the stage for the bigger story. Are we active or passive in our own lives? Do we do things or do we have things done to us? One thing I like throughout the book were the descriptions and imagery the author, Hannah Deitch, can conjure up. Her sentences like “Bootstrapping stories have kept capitalists’ dicks hard since the Gilded Age. But the thing about potential is that it’s purely speculative” or “the dark sinews of my body like an eel” really help to paint a picture. You can vividly picture it. I found it unique and fun. Her word choice is great…”gilded firmament of your life.” I also love learning so a couple things that she mentioned that I learned were about the Dimples of Venus and the words susurrus & sibilant which are fun to say. Authors gain points with me by doing this. In chapter 36, Hannah describes the differences between being poor and being wealthy in such an interesting way. I have never thought of it that way before but I could totally see it. It makes a lot of sense and thought she was clever with this paragraph. As I have stated there were many examples of the writing that I liked but now it is time for the negatives. The story started off with potential but I slowly lost interest in what was happening. I started to not care what happened with them or with the investigation. It was kind of boring and uneventful. There were no surprises for me and I didn’t like the development of the protagonist. I really didn’t like any character actually. I think the focus was more on big picture, existential topics of society and rich vs poor. I needed something to happen or it was just kind of like reading a philosophy book. As a debut novel though, it is not bad. This is exactly the type of book you read for a book club to discuss what they went through, how you can relate, and if things are justified or not. 

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Contested Reading And Yearning For A Better Life

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


“Butterflies too are few and so are flowers and most things that are beautiful.”

The House on Mango Street is a book containing several stories with multiple different characters and their lives. It focuses on the perspective of a young girl named Esperanza and growing up in Chicago. It is almost auto biographical but the author states that introduction that she wove in many different facets of the lives of people around her. It isn’t just one story but many. Sandra Cisneros writes in very short chapters and in everyday language. There is a lot of jumping between narratives and there is not one singular storyline. This is a short and quick read. It was written many decades ago and received both high praise and challenges for its content. It is a frequently challenged book which means everyone all the more reason to read and distribute it. Anytime someone tries to forbid you from reading something one should run as fast as possible towards it.

Sandra’s writing paints a very vivid account of life in the Latino section of Chicago. Her descriptions are detailed and transport us to what it must have been like living there. There were a couple funny moments but overall, it seemed very serious and subtle in the approach. The writing felt childlike with strong hints of stream of consciousness. I could picture a young girl thinking this when I was reading. It was her struggle of not wanting what she was seeing where she lived. Esperanza is very strong-willed and dreams of a better life. She has “decided not to grow up tame like the others” and as she says, “I have begun my own quiet war.” She rebels and in one instance she “is tired of looking at what we can’t have.” She wants more. One issue I had was it was very hard to keep all the names and stories straight. I was not fully in step with all the friendships and familial relationships throughout the telling. A lot of people were introduced in the book. There were descriptions of what was happening to them and some importance got lost with the sheer volume. You didn’t get to know other characters well as you jumped right into the next chapter. This is why I loved reading. You get to learn about things you might not have been exposed to and can see things from different perspectives. This is why everyone should read. Empathy can more easily develop through reading. I might have understood everything, and I cannot relate to growing up like she did but I gained a little something from reading this story. I can see why this book generates a lot of conversation, especially by showing what a different world looks like. It has a theme of recognizing where you come from and what helps shape you but wanting something better. “Like it or not you are Mango Street.”

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