Hawa’s Comments (group member since Mar 02, 2018)

Hawa’s comments from the The Digital Book Club: Create. Learn. Inspire. group.

I returned my copy of the library book so I can’t post any direct quotes, but I absolutely loved Becoming! I had really high expectations and it did not disappoint. Even as a former First Lady, she came across as so relatable. Initially I didn’t think this book was gonna tell me anything about her that I didn’t already know but I was wrong. People often place so much emphasis on the fact that she was a lawyer but I had no idea how much her personal career strayed from that path. She even shuts down any idea of her running for president in this book 😂 I went through so many emotions reading this book. Reading about the loss of her father almost brought me to tears and reading about the love her and Barack have for each other made me gush lol

Hey everyone! So I’m really enjoying this month’s read so far. I’m already in the middle of chapter 5 and I’m trying to pace myself because I don’t want to finish before the halfway mark of the month. I’m at work right now, so I’ll come back with specifics of how I feel about certain parts later. One of my favorite things about this book so far is how she goes back and forth between her childhood and the incidents that took place in her adult life. The references to her childhood make her come across as a lot more relatable than I expected.

Hi everyone! As the month is coming to an end, I just wanted everyone to come together and share their final thoughts about this month's read. I hope you all have gotten a chance (or are coming close) to finish the book.

The Hate U Give is one of those books that I had seen all over Bookstagram and I had been wanting to read it for a while so I was really excited when Courtney revealed it was the read for this month. I definitely believed that the book lived up to it's hype.

In case anyone hasn't finished the book yet, I will post the rest of my thoughts under a spoiler tag. So click to read more.

(view spoiler)[My favorite thing about this book is that just like in real life, you never really knew what was going to happen next. I truly wanted to believe that there would be some just for Khalil in the end, but it was later revealed that was not the case.

I love how the author explored what life is like for the friends and family of police brutality. Starr's hesitation to speak out at first made a lot of sense to me because doing that would be opening herself up to harassment and judgement as though she was the one who did something wrong. (Just like with Rachel Jeantel, Trayvon Martin's friend who was on the phone with him before he lost his life at the hands of George Zimmerman)

I do believe that this book has many different talking points and I love that it explores different sides of them. It doesn't necessarily make all cops out to be the bad guys, all white people to be racists, or drug dealers to be bad people. It even goes as far to explore why people in certain communities feel the need to riot, instead of just painting them all as "animals".

Finally I'll say, I am so happy that Starr found her voice in the end. Although the grand jury decided not to indict the cop for killing Khalil, she spoke out and let the world know who her friend truly was. (hide spoiler)]

I hope you all enjoyed this book as much as I did! To keep up with me and other books that I've been reading, follow me on Instagram @hawa.reads (#shamelessplug)

Thank you for sharing Kayla and Robbin!

Kayla, I agree. I love how relatable the author makes the book, even if it’s just through certain song or clothing references.

Robbin, I’m glad you were able to get started! Hopefully none of our posts were too much of a spoiler for you.

This book definitely is a page turner. I’ve been trying to pace myself for discussion purposes though.

Based on where you’re at in the book, do you believe that they will get justice for Khalil?

Please feel free to share any other thoughts you may have about the book based on where you’re at.

Thank you for sharing Courtney! I think we posted both our comments at the same time so I initially didn’t see yours. But I agree with what you said. Sounds like I’ve got a bit of catching up to do lol.

Hi everyone! Just checking in again. Where is everyone in the book so far?

Thanks for sharing Naomie!

Just in the few chapters that we have read so far, it makes me wonder how people who witness such events of police brutality in real life feel. I can definitely see why her first reaction isn’t to speak up. Often times it seems as though the deceased are put on trial as they try to look up every single “negative” thing about that person’s past. I’m interested to see how they will try to spin the fact that Khalil was a drug dealer.

I’m also interested in seeing how her prep school friends and boyfriend will react. I wonder how long before she even tells them. Especially her boyfriend. I know at this moment they’re in the midst of a “fight”, but that’s not something she can keep from him forever.

Hi everyone! Welcome to May!

I hope you all are at least half as excited as I am about this month's choice as I am. This book has been on my TBR (to be read) list for a while now, so I am excited to get the chance to read it and discuss it with you all!

This book is a bit lengthy compared to our past reads but I hope you all have at least made it through chapter 4.

The book starts off following our main character, Starr, as she attends a Spring Break house party in her Garden Heights neighborhood with her friend Kenya. Starr doesn't really care to be at the party, but she eventually catches up with an old childhood friend Khalil. The party gets cut short when gunshots go off and Starr and Khalil run to his car for safety. He then offers to give her a ride home. They get pulled over by a police officer who fatally shoots Khalil after he makes a sudden move. This scene sets the premise of the entire novel.

Before we learn that Khalil gets shot, the second chapter begins by Starr saying how her parent had "two talks with her" when she was 12, the usual "birds and bees" talk and "what to do if a cop stopped [her]". (page 20)
Her mother expresses that she believes that she is too young for her father to have such a talk with her. Given the events that have taken place in the novel and in real life, do you agree or disagree?

Starr discusses how when other Black lives are lost, she signed petitions, retweeted and reblogged RIP and said "I always said that if I saw it happen to somebody, I would have the loudest voice, making sure the world knew what went down. Now I am that person, and I'm too afraid to speak." (page 35) Do you think the she will continue to stay silent or will she speak up?

After the loss of her friend Natasha when she was 10, her parents moved her to the fancy suburban prep school (Williamson) that she now attends. (page 35) Starr seems to live a double life between her home life and school, when do you think those worlds will collide?

Those are just a couple of questions I wanted to pose after reading the first couple of chapters. I know I said up through chapter 4, so feel free to share anything that stood out to you and another questions you may wanna pose to the group as well!

Hey everyone! My name is Hawa. As a kid, I always loved reading and my nose was always in a book. As I got old, I struggled with finding books that caught my attention and I stopped reading altogether. However within the last year, I’ve really been working on building up my personal library and reading more. This is the first book club I’ve been a part of which is exciting because I’ve always wanted to join one!

I post a lot about some of the other books I’m reading on Twitter and Instagram, so follow me on there if you wish🤗

Instagram: @hawacopter
Twitter: @hawapocalypse

I had been reading “The Four Agreements” and another book at the same time. I finished the other book and I feel like finishing that one allowed me to really get more into “The Four Agreements”, so I just wanted to share a couple quotes that stood out to me.

“Being impeccable with your word is the correct use of your energy; it means to use your energy in the direction of truth and love for yourself. If you make an agreement with yourself to be impeccable with your word, just with that intention? The truth will manifest through you and clean all the emotion poison that exists within you.” (32-33)

“Impeccability of the word will also give you immunity from anyone putting a negative spell on you. You will only receive a negative idea if your mind is fertile ground for that idea.” (43)

“Nothing other people do is because of you. It is because of themselves. All people live in their own dream, in their own mind; they are in a completely different world from the one we live in.” (48)

“When you take things personally, then you feel offended, and your reaction is to defend your beliefs and create conflicts. You make something big out of something so little, because you have the need to be right and make everybody else wrong.” (50)

“It is always better to ask questions than to make an assumption, because assumptions set is up for suffering.” (65)

I’ll probably be done with this book by the end of the week. But I’ll probably go over it once more to jot down some of my favorite quotes in a journal and/or highlight them. I’ve never really been one to mark up my books or journal along-side with them, but I’ve seen some of you all suggest that and I see how that can be helpful with a book like this and trying to apply parts of it to my life.