Dave Eggers
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 170
Average rating: 4.5 of 5
What was the What? 5 out of 5 stars.
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Valentino Achak Deng's story alone would have been enough to win my approval of this fine piece of literature. Although What is the What by Dave Eggers was officially published as a novel, it is the true survival story of a Sudanese boy and his eventual transition to American culture. This is the type of book that can make you laugh and cry. Although it is a tragic story, Eggers includes scenes that show life in such a dark time, which can leave a smile on the reader's face.
Perhaps the most amazing thing about this first person novel is that it is not an autobiography. Although Eggers writes Valentino's story, Eggers masterfully takes on Valentino's voice. As I read the novel, I completely forgot that 8 year old Valentino himself had not authored the book.
Through the doorway I saw some kind of airplane, coming low over the village. It was a fascinating kind of plane, black everywhere and dull, unreflective. The planes I had seen before resembled birds in a rudimentary way, with noses and wings and chests, but this machine looked nothing so much as a cricket (75).
Eggers is one of the few talented writes that can maintain the simplicity of a child point of view, and simultaneously use the skill of a great writer to create a sophisticated passage. The helicopters that attacked Valentino's village look like "crickets," but only in a "rudimentary way." Eggers's contrast in diction in this scene shows his talent to merge simplicity and complexity.
The book is essentially two different stories that are beautifully woven together. The first is about Valentino's childhood hardships as a refugee, and the second is about some of the hardships he experiences once living in America. Eggers transitions between the two flawlessly which implicitly compares and contrasts the two worlds Valentino struggled through. He even completely combines present and past when he tells Valentino's past to various characters in present America including Julian, a hospital attendant: "The walk to Ethiopia, Julian, was only the beginning. Yes we had walked for months across deserts and wetlands, our ranks thinned daily. There was war all over southern Sudan... (256)." The story is not being told to the reader, but rather to Julian. Julian is an insignificant character to the story, but using him as a listener creates informality in the writing. Because Eggers writes to a certain person, he can really expand on the emotions that Valentino felt as he fled his country. It was a brilliant way for Eggers to narrate the story.
What is the What is a literary masterpiece with an epic story. It is written in such a beautiful way and describes such a moving story that this book cannot be left unread once started. It teaches the reader much about Sudanese history, human rights, and assimilation to American culture. Dave Eggers and Valentino Achak Deng share with us a magnificent story that should have a place on every bookshelf.
Editorial Review:
In a heartrending and astonishing novel, Eggers illuminates the history of the civil war in Sudan through the eyes of Valentino Achak Deng, a refugee now living in the United States. We follow his life as he's driven from his home as a boy and walks, with thousands of orphans, to Ethiopia, where he finds safety — for a time. Valentino's travels, truly Biblical in scope, bring him in contact with government soldiers, janjaweed-like militias, liberation rebels, hyenas and lions, disease and starvation — and a string of unexpected romances. Ultimately, Valentino finds safety in Kenya and, just after the millennium, is finally resettled in the United States, from where this novel is narrated. In this book, written with expansive humanity and surprising humor, we come to understand the nature of the conflicts in Sudan, the refugee experience in America, the dreams of the Dinka people, and the challenge one indomitable man faces in a world collapsing around him.
