![]() WestportREADS is underway, and author Pete Hamill will visit Hebron in May to discuss "Snow in August," chosen by the Eastern Connecticut Libraries as its area's book. Smaller communities also are reading together. Chicago embraced Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird." The One Book, One City campaign in Los Angeles has just selected Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451," which immediately shot to the top of the Los Angeles Times bestseller list. The One Book programs began in Seattle, which launched the first community reading project four years ago with "The Sweet Hereafter" by Russell Banks. She is also the author of "Krik? Krak!," a 1995 collection that was a finalist for a National Book Award, and the 1998 novel, "The Farming of Bones." "Breath, Eyes, Memory" was published in 1994 (Soho Press, $20), when Danticat was 25, and is available in paperback (Vintage Books, $12). She began writing as a teenager and earned a degree in French literature from Barnard College and a master's degree in writing from Brown University. She was born in Port-au-Prince in 1969 and lived with relatives before joining her parents in New York at age 12. The story is not based directly on Danticat's life, but there are similarities. The book won wide critical praise, but Danticat has said she encountered criticism from some middle-class Haitian American women who were embarrassed by the revelation of the practice. ![]() ![]() The practice of "testing" by rural Haitian mothers, who physically examine their daughters to see if they are still virgins, adds drama. In the background are Haiti's political unrest and poverty. Martine is tormented by memories of the rape that conceived Sophie and produced an unwelcome legacy of tension between mother and daughter. ![]() Suddenly, Sophie is summoned to New York City by her mother, Martine, whom she barely knows. The novel tells the story of Sophie, a 12-year-old living happily with her aunt and grandmother in Haiti. ![]()
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