Humor? -- Breanna Poole

Humor

This book nearly moved me to tears within the first few pages, as hearing on the third page that a nine year old Trevor was forced to jump out of car made me realize how serious this issue was within seconds. This is a hard read, not on a technical level, but on an emotional level. To hear the story of a boy who is a crime because he was born, who was forced to not be in public with his parents, who was forced to be given a fake nationality just no to raise suspicion....It makes my heart bleed with empathy and sorrow that anyone at any point had to live through this.

What surprised the most about this book was that at many times it was....funny. Trevor Noah at times would drop in a line or a comment that would cause me to laugh, which I would immediately feel bad about it because this is a terrible tragedy and here I am laughing. I know that Trevor Noah is a comedian by trade, that's what he is good at -- making things funny -- but still, it's something I did not expect. After reading such serious novels on the injustice people suffered, I was surprised that Noah took a completely different route and used humor quite often.

I look forward to reading more of this book, and reading what y'all have to say about it!

P.S. I commented on Jaime and Osten's posts.

Comments

Zane Duke said…
I think the point of this book is that Trevor Noah has the sense of humor that he does because he chose to live life focused on the positive and not on the negative. Not to mention his mom's impeccable determination to succeed with whatever she set out to do, no matter how against the law it was to do it, I think that Trevor doesn't fall far from her tree. It is so funny to me as well and I'm sure everyone else that the social issues in this work aren't undermined, but simply that ridiculous!