“NaTasha Jennings is the only person of color in an entire school district and her grandmother, Tillithia Mae Evans (Tilly), doesn’t like it. She believes her granddaughter is isolated and she wants her to get out into the world and experience things for herself. NaTasha’s parents agree to let her spend the summer with Tilly in the Bronx. Will NaTasha be able to handle life in a place so different from what she’s used to or will she go back home before the summer is over?
I know this book is about NaTasha but I really have to start with Tilly: I liked this godly woman , who was full of wisdom and could cook up a storm. I enjoyed her humor and it was nice how everyone loved her and I really loved how much she loved NaTasha. For the most part she was a positive influence on her granddaughter, but I didn’t see why she thought that putting NaTasha amongst a bunch of angry, lost girls would help her to learn about who she is. With all the hurt Miss Tilly experienced in her life, I can’t understand why she felt it’d be beneficial to put NaTasha in a place where she could experience the same hurts. In the predominantly white world she lived in, NaTasha had no peers who looked like her. She made certain choices to try to fit in and to be liked by the guys. At Amber’s Place there may have been girls of color but she was bullied (verbally and physically abused) by those girls because they felt she was nothing like them. She seemed to be an outcast no matter where she was. It saddened me that she was placed in such a hostile environment to ‘find herself’. NaTasha’s dad and mom were concerned about her, as they should have been, and so was I.
NaTasha was a good girl with a good heart and lots of common sense. At one point, she had the opportunity to get back at one of the girl’s who had harmed her, but she took the high road and when a certain guy turned out to be totally different than what she thought, she didn’t allow herself to be pressured into doing something she knew she’d regret. She was placed in a hostile environment to ‘find herself’, which, again, I did not think was necessary, but she did find new friends, even though they’d probably never be best friends and she was able to get help styling her natural hair. She also learned a very important lesson from a rough summer in the Bronx: There’s always going to be someone who wouldn’t like her for whatever reason, so it was easier for her to just be herself.
Quiana: Trouble maker and instigator. I figured she was striking out because she was hurting. People who are hurting can be the cruelest people, always ready to project their anger and disappointment. She was the way she was for a reason; what happened to her was a shame. I didn’t like her in the beginning and I liked her just a bit in the end. She was hard on the outside, but the girl had a good heart.
Maria was in a situation that, unfortunately, many of today’s teenage girls end up in. Monique wasn’t very good at choosing her boyfriends. Or maybe she didn’t think she deserved better. And Shauna’s story was really a sad one. The choice she made because of a poor self-image was sad and shocking. I had to ask myself if fitting in is really that important to some young people. That’s a question I can’t answer, but I hope not.
This was an interesting read that brought back a few memories. (Thank God, I no longer have to sit in front of the stove so my mom can take a hot straightening comb through my hair) There was profanity, but not much and I liked that the author had no problem including a church service or having Miss Tilly talk about the Lord and give God praise.
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