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I admit to approaching this book with a few concerns. First and foremost was my general twitchyness about white people writing about POC. The farther you are from a culture the less I feel you can actual talk honestly about what that situation is like.
Having read it I still don't actually know how I feel.
To be clear: the lives of the people in Annawadi need to be told. There certainly needs to be light shown into the lives of the very poor in Mumbai and, indeed, throughout the world. I was grateful for a chance to know even a little more about what life in such slums is like. Boo clearly wants to understand everyone in Annawadi as people, not as statistics.
However, I often felt that the writing kept the reader at arm's length. While the honesty about the good and bad the people in Annawadi do is refreshing, the writing is so dispassionate at times as to be off-putting. It is possible that, in her desire not to be biased and truthful, Boo failed to realize that a little more compassion in her writing might have made the story less jarring.
I have no way of knowing how honest the people in Annawadi were with Boo. Not necessarily about the facts of what happened, but what they were feeling, their motivations, these are harder to know for sure. I am grateful, too, for the insight into the corruption in India which I certainly feel needs to be told loudly and in as many places as possible, just as corruption in any country should be.
Overall I am glad I read the book but I am taking it with a grain of salt because, frankly, I don't know what else to do. Boo clearly knows a great deal more than the average American about life in Mumbai slums but I would still prefer to hear tales from actual Indian people. Maybe it's not possible for that to happen because of India's current socialeconimcal structure. Maybe no one from the slums is particularly interested in telling their story. Maybe this is as close as we will ever get to understand what that life is like without living it ourselves. I'm glad Boo wanted to share this story. I wish I could think more highly of it than I do...
Having read it I still don't actually know how I feel.
To be clear: the lives of the people in Annawadi need to be told. There certainly needs to be light shown into the lives of the very poor in Mumbai and, indeed, throughout the world. I was grateful for a chance to know even a little more about what life in such slums is like. Boo clearly wants to understand everyone in Annawadi as people, not as statistics.
However, I often felt that the writing kept the reader at arm's length. While the honesty about the good and bad the people in Annawadi do is refreshing, the writing is so dispassionate at times as to be off-putting. It is possible that, in her desire not to be biased and truthful, Boo failed to realize that a little more compassion in her writing might have made the story less jarring.
I have no way of knowing how honest the people in Annawadi were with Boo. Not necessarily about the facts of what happened, but what they were feeling, their motivations, these are harder to know for sure. I am grateful, too, for the insight into the corruption in India which I certainly feel needs to be told loudly and in as many places as possible, just as corruption in any country should be.
Overall I am glad I read the book but I am taking it with a grain of salt because, frankly, I don't know what else to do. Boo clearly knows a great deal more than the average American about life in Mumbai slums but I would still prefer to hear tales from actual Indian people. Maybe it's not possible for that to happen because of India's current socialeconimcal structure. Maybe no one from the slums is particularly interested in telling their story. Maybe this is as close as we will ever get to understand what that life is like without living it ourselves. I'm glad Boo wanted to share this story. I wish I could think more highly of it than I do...
