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Where is the “oh jeez, what” subject heading?

September 17, 2014 Leave a comment

 

So, today I’m cataloging retro titles. I came upon this book, Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat and after reading the NLS annotation my reaction was:

“Oh jeez, what?” and then, “Where is the ‘good lord, what the hell’” subject heading when you really need it?”

Then I looked up the title online to compare descriptions.  This really does come down to the original purpose of this blog: NLS’s crazy, mixed up, misguided, and occasionally, FAR OUT annotations.

breath-eyes-memoryFrom the NLS Annotation:

Until age twelve, Sophie is raised by her aunt in Haiti. Her mother then sends for her to come to New York and explains that Sophie is the product of rape. When a grown Sophie is befriended by an older musician, her mother tests her virginity. Sophie rebels by violently deflowering herself, an act that caused her to seek sexual phobia therapy. She marries the musician and tries to come to terms with her past as her mother does the same. Some violence.

 

Oh jeez, what the what?  Pretty much the end of every sentence of this annotation is cringe-worthy.  Rape. Virginity. Sexual phobia therapy. Haiti.  And…only some violence?  This is a book that contains, by description, a violent self deflowering and the best we can do is “some violence” but no, not even a little bit of “descriptions of sex,” explicit or otherwise? Uhhhhh.

So, like I said, I visited the internet to find out if its just me, or is this book weird (?).  Turns out, it’s been an Oprah’s Book Club selection.  I was like, “sensational, much?”  But then I read the Amazon description from July 2003.  Turns out, it’s not JUST a book about virginity verification and violent deflowering after all.  Yay?

 

breathFrom Amazon:

At the age of twelve, Sophie Caco is sent from her impoverished village of Croix-des-Rosets to New York, to be reunited with a mother she barely remembers. There she discovers secrets that no child should ever know, and a legacy of shame that can be healed only when she returns to Haiti–to the women who first reared her. What ensues is a passionate journey through a landscape charged with the supernatural and scarred by political violence, in a novel that bears witness to the traditions, suffering, and wisdom of an entire people.

 

When presented from this angle, the book seems downright interesting, engrossing, enlightening, and, dare I say, worth a read?

NLS, I realize that this is a very old annotation…1994 to be semi-exact.  So, I’m not going to rail too hard.  Let’s assume this annotation writer has moved on to other tasks at the NLS…director, deputy director, collection development…something innocuous that doesn’t put them in direct access to the books, or the humans, or writing PR copy.  Uh oh.

Anyway, that is all.  Now back to cataloging this backlog of 4 months and 2,000 titles.

Edited to say: Make that 3,000 and change.

 
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