On the road again . . .

The book opens with a young boy (12) waiting sleeplessly in his room for his mom and her new boyfriend to come back. He is all packed, ready for a trip across the country. But this isn't a fun vacation -- his mother is sending him on a Greyhound bus from Stockton, California to Altoona, Pennsylvania. Chain-smoking and impatient, she can't wait to dump him so that she can run off to get married (again) without being bogged down by her son. Sebastien is shy, he stutters, he knows nothing about bus schedules or transfers, and he begins the trip with only the $35 his mother reluctantly gives him. His inner voice expresses the anger and frustration with his mom, but he has gotten used to keeping his thoughts to himself, as he remembers beatings, ridicule, and other consequences of speaking up. Somehow Sebastien is taken under the wing of Marcus, an ex-con also traveling cross-country, and the two of them share adventures, dangers, and a growing knowledge of how to work the Greyhound system -- where to sit on the bus, where to eat at the stops, and how to deal with the drivers. This book has been compared to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and I would agree. Marcus is like Jim in his wisdom (or is it just life experience and street smarts?) Some of the best parts come during the conversations that Sebastien and Marcus share about life, troubles, literature, the future, and so on. It's also enjoyable to read about the "world of Greyhoune" (history!), and the places they visit - each stop seems to have its own culture, which the author represents in the characters these two encounter along the way. A question I had at the end - is this autobiographical? (the question sparked by the photo of a young boy, dated "circa 1981" accompanied by the specific dates that are spread throughout the book. Hmmmm.....) All in all, this was a great "vacation read," and a quality representative of the "road trip" genre. I would give this book 3 1/2 out of 4 stars.

Futility of Africans' Plight

The Faculty Book Club chose this book for our April book, so I took it with me to Mexico over Spring Break. What a downer! Apparently Oprah and Anderson Cooper had raved about this book and how it would open one's eyes to the reality of what so many people in Africa are dealing with. The books has won multiple awards. So I went in expecting to be enlightened and inspired. Instead, I found it unrelentingly depressing. There are three short stories and two longer novellas - each one centering on a child living in a different country. The first one deals with an impoverished street family. The oldest, a 12-year-old-girl, is supporting the family through prostitution. She's giving the secrets of the trade to her 10-year-old sister to get her ready. The narrator brother is destined to go off to school - he is their future and their hope. But he can't stand the guilt - so runs away. HOPELESS. Then there is the story about an uncle who "saves" his niece and nephew from their parents who are dying of AIDS -- only to sell them into slavery. HOPELESS. Follow that story up with the one about a young man running away from marauding revolutionaries in the Islamic north to the Christian area in the south (his mother was Islamic; his father was Christian). He is on a bus -- and the very long story deals with the people on the bus talking about the politics, religion, and other philosophies -- and his fear that he'll be discovered and killed. Which is what happens at the end. HOPELESS. Or how about the one where a Rwandan family is destroyed when the father is forced by tribal revolutionaries to murder his wife -- and the reader knows that his children are also facing imminent death. HOPELESS. Why am I telling you the end of these stories? To save you from the depression that enveloped me after trudging through this collection. The thing is, you come out of this book without any idea of what will ever solve the problems all those people are facing. The conflicts based on colonially-imposed borders and the inequality (politically and economically) between factions is not going away. The disease, poverty, and overall lack of hope for a decent future seem unrelenting. I was not enriched by reading this book. Nor was I disturbed in a good way -- one that might have encouraged me to take action to improve the situations. The stories were poisons that infected me - and I just needed a good Disney movie or two to clear them out.

1 out of 4 stars.