Helene Cooper recounts the events of her childhood The House at Sugar Beach. Because of the violenxe back home, Helene moves with part of her family to America. The switch from Liberia to America is a big one and some that takes getting used to. Cooper talks about the small changes that made the US so different. One of them being, "'You two are going to be taking the school bus,' Daddy told me and Marlene. We were both appalled" (215). Usually their dad drove them to school, but now it's different which makes the adjustment more apparent to Helene. She compares her old home to her new one, obviously not being to fond of it saying, "If I were riding into downtown Monrovia from Sugar Beach, I would see ten people I knew before we got to Sinkor. But here, no one even seemed to walk around outside" (219). Helene is missing the familiarity of her home for so long and now must face, not only a new country but a new school.
Helene Cooper and her family do eventually go back to Liberia and Sugar Beach and face what they had run away from. Helene is older and can now comprehend what went on in Liberia and what it means to rehash it all. Cooper conveys this feeling, saying, "...none of us who had been there the day the soldiers came, wanted to go back. I certainly didn't really want to go. Going back to Sugar Beach meant confronting that night, coming face-to-face with the death of my childhood" (339). Helene is fully aware of what going back means, but she's still willing to work through it. Since the book starts at almost the beginning of Helene's life this shows the maturity she now has compared to before. It was compelling to grow up with her and see her overcome a huge mountain, which she did. Cooper does this by realizing what her mother has done for her and finally puts her past where it belongs, "My mother had made a stand here. She had fought for us. She had fought for her daughters to remain children, and even thought that night had seen the end of my childhood, still, somehow she had won" (344).
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2 comments:
This sounds like an inspiring book. Your first paragraph was really easy to relate to, especially because we started high school this year. Granted, it's not a new country, but it's a whole new environment that took a little getting used to. About your second paragraph - the great thing about an autobiography is it allows us to do just what you said. We get to see the a great portion of someone's life and all the ways they changed throughout it.
Books about people coming to an environment unfamiliar to themselves, but that you as the reader can relate to are interesting. It makes you think about all of the aspects of your environment that don't stand out to you, but to someone unfamiliar would look really strange.
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