Released: January 2010
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
is Heidi W Durrow's first novel, and was the winner of the Bellwether Prize for best fiction addressing social justice issues. Heidi W Durrow also writes short stories and essays, which can be found on her website at
http://heidiwdurrow.com/other-words/.
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
is the mysterious story behind a young girl of mixed heritage named Rachel; her mother being Danish and her father African-American. The mystery surrounding Rachel is the question of why she is still alive, as she "fell" from the top of an apartment building with her mother and siblings on a mattress and was the only survivor. Another major part of the plot concerns how the biracial Rachel comes to terms with her identity in a world that wants to see her as either black or white; not as a mixture of both races.
Throughout the reading of
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
, we learn about the types of people capable of not only being open and accepting of a concept that should be the norm in a modern society, but also the types of people capable of giving and receiving genuine love.
It's been nearly a month since I read
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
and I'm still unsure about my feelings for the novel. From a one-dimensional viewpoint, I don't understand -- or better yet, I cannot relate to why the identity crisis is so impacting to Rachel and the story overall. I feel that the racial subject matter as a whole has just been beaten to the ground in recent years and shoved down my throat. Maybe I truly am modern (or maybe it's just because I'm white!) and this is why I don't understand the racial struggles, which I can openly admit. However, re-evaluating the novel from Rachel's point of view, I can appreciate this novel and understand how and why it speaks out against social injustice. Although I am not a product of two completely different races, I can only imagine how difficult it can be growing up and dealing with people who have certain reservations on biracial people or just on blacks or whites in general.
I really enjoyed trying to figure out what truly happened to Rachel's family on the tragic day of their deaths; the novel will really keep you guessing until the end. I also like how each chapter and section is told from a different point of view by each character.
If you read
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
, I highly recommend checking out the author's website at
http://heidiwdurrow.com/. Durrow is an absolutely gorgeous woman and looks exactly as Rachel is described! After reading her biography and some of her FAQs, I have more insight on the novel and appreciate it even more than I did when I began writing this review several minutes ago. I actually recommend visiting Heidi's website
before you read
The Girl Who Fell From the Sky![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=1616200154)
, especially if you're not sure how you're going to approach it after reading this review.
This novel has been compared to
The Bluest Eye![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=0307278441)
(1969) by Toni Morrison and
Annie John![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=0374525102)
(1985) by Jamaica Kincaid. Although I have not yet read anything by Jamaica Kincaid, I do recommend all of Toni Morrison's work -- everything written by her is, of course, a masterpiece.
![](http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=drboreonevge-20&l=bil&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=0307278441)
![Annie John: A Novel](http://ws.amazon.com/widgets/q?MarketPlace=US&ServiceVersion=20070822&ID=AsinImage&WS=1&Format=_SL160_&ASIN=0374525102&tag=drboreonevge-20)
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for stopping by - can't wait to see what you have to say!