Little Bee
by Chris
Cleave
Oh Little Bee,
Little Bee, I really did want to like you! I felt both peer
pressured and morally obligated to like you, and yet I just
couldn't. And it's difficult to explain to a potential
reader why that is, because the crux of the book is such that it
has to be uncovered as the novel is being read. I can offer
very little in terms of character or plot summation without
compromising the impact of the book's punch.
There
were certainly specific things about the book that I did like,
including the ability of the male author to write from the points
of view of the two female narrators; Little Bee, a young Nigerian
refugee and Sarah, a successful British journalist and
businesswoman. Little Bee in particular was a wonderful
character who absolutely charmed me with her simultaneously wise
and naive views of the world. Her thoughts were humorous and
poetic, simplified and alarmingly insightful. I'd even
venture to say that the first couple chapters of the
book, told through Little Bee's thoughts and stream of
consciousness, could stand alone as one of my favorite
short stories ever.
Shortly after that, though,
things got ugly. I can appreciate the fact that the author's
intent was to bring attention to the atrocities occurring in
Africa caused by global industry and commercialism and the
inhumane conditions of immigration detention centers (and those
are certainly issues that deserve attention) but his method was to
incorporate a level of brutality that rivals the worst I've ever
read. I felt a little like the author took something from me
by putting me through that and didn't give me anything in
return. The rest of the book didn't earn that brutality for
me. I felt empty afterwards. But...perhaps that was
also the author's intent in an effort to raise awareness
emotionally, and if that's the case then he was
successful.
While Little Bee was a very charming,
admirable character, the others in the book were unlikeable for
me, which made the story even harder to enjoy since I
was unsympathetic. Their problems were petty and even
obnoxious and it was difficult for me to muster even an ounce of
caring for their issues compared to those of Little Bee, but
again, maybe that was the point. Their problems are so much
more identifiable and reasonable to those of us not living in
a chaotic war-torn third world country than what she had gone
through, which at times seems almost unbelievable. A
recurring theme was the juxtaposition of the two worlds in an
effort to show they are two sides of the same coin;
completely opposite and still absolutely connected. Also
recurring is the moral dilemma of whether to sacrifice
oneself in some way for the benefit of another human being,
and whether the answer to that quandary changes if the person
is a stranger.
So I don't think I would recommend the
book, simply because I think that I would rather have not read it
myself. But because the book has garnered such rave
reviews and because anything you read about the book is so
deliberately vague, I suspect that curiosity alone will drive many
to read the novel, which is what happened to me, and that
won't be such a bad thing for everyone.
A New Review here
every two weeks
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