before you suffocate your own fool self review

Disgusted by Tara’s reaction, Allison behaves similar to her grandmother, controlling and belittling Tara. Terrified, Tara is unable to leave the house she is paralyzed with fear.

When the girls challenge their grandmother’s authority, she tells them there are deadly anacondas in the area if they leave the house, they will be bitten and killed. Her grandmother is not pleased with this situation. “Snakes” tells the story of Tara, a black girl who is sent to live with her white grandmother and her cousin Allison in Tallahassee when her parents go on an extended work trip. Erica goes home with Michael, deciding to sleep with his brother, thinking he is a safe choice to lose her virginity to, since losing it is inevitable, as far as she can tell. Jasmine is pressured by the men to sleep with one of them, but when Erica leaves, Jasmine chooses to stay. Jasmine is determined to meet cute boys, and when they arrive at a bar in Brooklyn, they meet a group of young men. Jasmine decides she wants to go downtown to the bars, using fake IDs she and Erica have acquired. She is upset because he is with his new girlfriend. At the movies, Jasmine sees a boy she has had sex with. She knows that it is expected that she will have sex at her age, but she has little interest in it.

Erica knows that everyone assumes that Michael is sleeping with either her or Jasmine and resents this. The first story, “Virgins,” is narrated by fifteen-year-old Erica, who is hanging out with her friends, Jasmine and Michael, at the pool owned by one of their teachers, Mr. Following a theme of bad decisions and their consequences, in her short story collection, Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self (2010), Danielle Evans explores the modern-day black experience in America.

Before you suffocate your own fool self review