4th Quarter 2024 Book Review
Viola Davis' 'Finding Me'
For our 4th quarter book review, I will be reviewing Viola Davis' memoir, 'Finding Me.'
So many things resonated with me and brought forth healing within me.
Hear my review on October 15th on YouTube and Instagram.
October 2023: Morgan Harper Nichols' 'Peace is a Practice'
Our October 2023 Book Review is of Morgan Harper Nichols' 'Peace is a Practice.
Morgan is an artist in pretty much every way that one can be an artist: she sings, writes, and draws.
I've been following Morgan's work since 2015 when her Storyteller album was released. I memorized every lyric to each song on the album and sang the lyrics to myself as she sung them aloud during her album release party.
Morgan is a supporter of great mental health, which this book seeks to encourage.
January 2023: Mariah Carey's The Meaning of Mariah Carey
The name of the book is The Meaning of Mariah Carey. Its themes are centered around Mariah’s growth, love, self-love, and her belief in herself and in the God who made her. From start to finish, this book is a must-read.
I sit in bed reflecting on this memoir that I read from cover to cover over a period of around six months. While reading this, I was in a strange season in my life – a season that was part happy and part sad, part gratitude and part misery.
I think that Mariah also had many days that were part gratitude and part misery. With a Christian upbringing but raised in a broken home, Mariah Carey had many dark days with just as many triumphs mixed throughout.
In this written review, I acknowledge a great and mighty win – that of Mariah showing her tormentors that they did not do irreparable damage to her heart and soul.
Please enjoy this written review and watch my upcoming video review if you’d like to hear more of my takeaways.
There are a few things that stood out to me about Mariah’s childhood: disheveled and unkempt hair; a mentally ill man sitting in a chair wielding a shotgun; a physical burn by her sister; emotional burns from her brother and mother; and a beautiful day on the beach.
One of her memories, however, that I’ve recounted to others is that of her spending time with a group of girls who she thought were her friends. One day, the group gathered at one of the girls’ homes for a sleepover.
Mariah was away from her own home, away from her mother, and at her most vulnerable.
During this event, most of the girls hurled racial slurs at the young Mariah.
Over
and over
and over
again.
Nigger.
Nigger.
You’re a nigger.
You’re a nigger.
Nigger.
The words resounded, leaving the lips of the young girls and echoing throughout the small room in which they had entrapped her.
I imagine that their body language was aggressive, that the hate was so instilled within them that it was engraved in their bodies, and that their small frames shook with the hate they had been aching to spew.
They gathered together, feeling strong and mighty.
There were at least four against one.
At least four who had been taught to hate a person based on something she could not control.
At least four angry, disgusted, disturbed bodies against one.
At least eight darkened eyes against two teary ones.
They had been planning all along to physically surround her, verbally abuse her, and willfully attempt to psychologically break her down and destroy her, hoping that she would be a shell of the girl who walked through the door that day.
If she stood frozen in shock and in fear, feeling small, feeling paralyzed, having even PTSD for a while, I can understand why. To be surrounded by a group of peers taunting you – and to go into that situation feeling like that group was one of the few things about your life that was light – is no light matter.
Due to all of the taunting and abuse, Mariah couldn’t believe her ears.
Through even this, however, our God showed Himself to be Mariah’s vindicator. Years later, she would drive up to the very home in which she was taunted. With Mariah and her mother dressed in the latest fashion and riding in the best of vehicles, Mariah’s tormentors would come face to face with her success.
This time, however, they would be the ones frozen, unable to believe what they were seeing with their very eyes – their very blueeyes – the same blue eyes that in their minds gave them reason to feel pride and confidence in their ethnicity, a thing they could not control and something that certainly was not a reflection of character.
I believe that driving up to their home was more about revealing the inner strength that she possessed rather than being flashy about the fact that she was no longer poor.
They hadn’t beaten her.
They hadn’t destroyed her.
They hadn’t won.
She arose victorious.
The hero within her arose victorious and arose with a song of the same name.
One of my favorite lines in the book is of Mariah saying that she didn’t believe what the world told her but instead believed that she could conquer the world she was born into in her own way.
Because she pushed and believed and continued to push and believe, Mariah is a prime example of a believer’s latter days being greater, more blessed, and more fruitful than her former.
Candid and worth the read, this memoir will stand the test of time as a life-changing work of art that reflects the life of a legend.
