Grief and its effects on an impoverished Haitian fishing village.On the morning of Claire Limyè Lanmè Faustin’s 7th birthday, a freak wave sweeps a local fisherman away. Claire’s father, Nozias, is also a fisherman, and her mother died giving her birth, so the sea poses a grave threat to this diminished family. Nozias decides it is time to seek a better life, which entails giving Claire up for adoption to bereaved Mme Gaëlle. Yet Claire, as cheerful but elusive as her middle names (“sea light”)

6.75/10While Danticat is a talented writer, I confess to being lost at sea on the acclaim that this one has received.This novel is as broken as the disparate lives within it: Danticat delivers a series of vignettes that never seem to quite come together, and frankly left me puzzling why so much good ink was spilled on something that was summed up much more effectively in one stanza of a Springsteen song: Spare parts, and broken hearts, Keep the world turning.It isn't that the individual stories

Claire of the Sea Light is as much about the intersection of the lives of a group of Haitians of different social standings, as it is an exercise in the art of storytelling. The elements and characters of the story fit creatively together in a refreshingly non-conventional fashion. It’s a pleasure to read the spirit of love and the care that Danticat infuses into the language of Claire. The essence of what made her non-fiction works shine is present here.The realism of Danticat’s writing gives t...

3.5 Love the title of this book and the cover, even though I read it on my kindle I can see the cover on this site. This book was like a circular maze, where the prize is in the middle and you just follow in circular movements. It starts with a young seven yr. old Claire going missing from her village and home. This is not a linear book so after this we learn about the villagers that make up this town called Ville Rose. At one point when they switched to a new story I thought to myself, what doe...

Claire of the Sea Light is the type of unforgettable novel that pulls at the heartstrings and produces an almost unbearable degree of searing emotion. Claire Limye Lanme Faustin is the title character, and she is, of course, focal to the narrative, but she also serves as the lightning rod from which multiple storylines are illuminated. Each of these tales has a rhapsodic quality, full of pain and brimming with enchantment. Danticat examines an array of complex characters from the town of Ville R...

Although I much preferred the more complex and historically significant novel by Danticat, The Farming of Bones, I still found myself transported to scenes I’d read in this one while washing dishes or brushing my teeth. The structure here is of multiple perspectives from a small, Haitian town, creating a quiet kind of sad. Her writing is sensual and alluring.

Ok let's make the book into a movie as soon as possible. Claire of the Sea Light should be played by Quvenzhane Wallis from Beast of the Southern Wild, and her father Nozias, should be played by Dwight Henry from Beast of the Southern Wild or better yet Forest Whitaker. I see Viola Davis as Gaelle, the shop keeper that Nozias wants to give his daughter to so that she will have a better life. I can just imagine what a beautiful picture this would be. I expected this book to be about what happened...

In the decade since Edwidge Danticat published her last novel, “The Dew Breaker,” Haiti has been drowned by hurricanes and shaken by earthquakes. At each cataclysmic crisis, the plight of her homeland dominated the world’s attention and then quickly faded into the background radiation of suffering that passes through most of us unnoticed.For someone born in Port-au-Prince, the temptation to rage at the public’s fickle concern must be immense. But in her rich new novel, “Claire of the Sea Light,”...

Edwidge Danticat has always been a writer of powerful beauty, but here, she surpasses herself. At the center of this luminous novel is Claire, and through interlocking stories concerning her, her father Nozias, and the other inhabitants of a small fishing village 28 miles from Port au Prince, she presents a vivid portrait of a community and its insularity. Employing creole patois and sensual visual detail, the land comes to life for a reader who has never visited Haiti. She carefully lays out th...

It is the seventh birthday of Claire Limye Lanme Faustin whose name means "Claire of the Sea Light" in Creole. Her birthday is also a day of death since Claire's mother died in childbirth, and her father brings her to the cemetery every year. On the morning of her seventh birthday, a huge wave overturned a fishing boat, and her father's good friend was lost in the sea.On her birthday, Claire's impoverished father has been asking Madame Gaelle, a wealthy widow who is mourning her young daughter's...

This book is the story of a community and its inhabitants. Ville Rose, Haiti, is a small fictional town located about twenty miles from Port au Prince. It reads like a series of short stories, bookended by the tale of Claire and her father. Claire’s mother died when she was born. Her father is a poor fisherman who has asked the local fabric vendor to adopt his daughter. It is a story of community, class, and corruption. Due to its beautiful title, I thought the book would be more about Claire, b...

I was really looking forward to Claire of the Sea Light because I am always interested in works that bring far-off places and cultures that I will probably never have the opportunity to visit to life. And while Danticat did provide a look inside the culture of Haiti, the constant changes of character perspectives and reversals in the timeline of the story made it difficult for me to ever connect with any of the characters. In fact, the Claire of the title may be the least important or interestin...

***************************************This is an intoxicating weave of vignettes, populated by an endearing cast of characters. And there is no single protagonist either; they are all so important to this tale.Perhaps the protagonist here is Haiti herself. Claire Limyè Lanmè—Creole for Claire of the Sea Light—certainly draws you into her world so much that you are tempted to think of her as just that protagonist. But so many other significant souls swim by the reader that it becomes clear that

An audio I stumbled across, as it was available, this was also my first time reading Danticat and my first time getting a look at Haiti, and I liked both, although Danticat may not be ideal on audio.Claire of the Sea Light is the translation from Creole French of one character's name who shows up in the beginning and then isn't heard from again for a long time. The novel is actually a series of connected short stories that overlap in story line and, for most, tie into the same moment. They give

This was the first book I read by this author and I read it quite a long time ago but never forgot it. I had been living in another state and was missing my family and friends so I went browsing and found some unique books. This was one of them.Claire of the Sea Light tells a poignant story of a small girl who goes missing from a Fishermans village. It is a pretty short read and beautifully written.I read some of the other reviews and ratings are all over the place. I think I'd give this a four