Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston

So...this  is my first book post. I'm a writer, so I thought this would be easy. I used to be really good at book reports. As I reread the post, well, it's a little rough. I hope you'll bear with me as I regain my footing at this. If I don't publish something, I'll chicken out and not do anything.

Recently, I was fortunate enough to be included in a training with Dr. Sharroky Hollie - a leading proponent of Culturally and Linguistically Responsive pedagogy. During his program, he challenged us - a bunch of white, middle class ladies - to learn about lingual differences between ourselves and those of another culture. One of the books he mentioned was Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. He said it would be a good way for us to learn a little bit about African American Vernacular English. I was not prepared for what I was to encounter.

The story revolves around Janie, a beautiful African-American girl who - during the course of the book - grows up (duh). We learn about her adventures and the different men in her life. Janie is a complex character and she's forced to make tough decisions during the course of her life. It's an exciting and interesting story of one person's life, but what really stands out is the prose. It's just beautiful and lyrical - almost like music.

As I mentioned before, the book features AAVE or African American Vernacular English. What I wasn't prepared for is the fact that there were whole scenes in the book that I didn't understand. I've been reading since pre-K, and have had no trouble with comprehension, but this book stumped me on several occasions. It was a very valuable lesson for me because it made me understand what struggling readers go through - WITH EVERYTHING THEY READ. Suck-o-rama.

Anyhow, it was a really, really good book. Highly recommend if you want to blow your mind open.