Whore

Lynch, T. (2006). Whore. Columbus, OH: Triple Crown Publications. ISBN 978-0-9767894-6-8

Why read this book

What chance does 14-year-old Kamone have when her mother abandons her and her younger siblings and the landlady forces her into prostitution to keep the kids together? Can this story have a happy ending?

Plot summary

In the opening pages of this story, 14-year-old Kamone prepares baloney sandwiches for her 2-year-old brother Paul and her 6-year-old sister Ivory while their mother Suge services a trick in the next room. Before long Suge, who is addicted to heroine, disappears. Kamone steals from the local grocery store to keep feeding Paul and Ivory and she tells the landlady, Cookie, who is Suge’s madam, that Suge hasn’t been around because she’s sick. Kamone is afraid that if Cookie knows the truth she will turn them over to the public welfare department and they will be split up.

Kamone’s subterfuge lasts a month, and when Cookie finds out that Suge is gone, she forces Kamone into the trade. At first a transvestite prostitute named Brittany helps Kamone break into the work, but Brittany quickly becomes jealous of the attention that Kamone is getting on the street and sets Kamone up for a gang rape. The men are so brutal that they think they’ve killed Kamone and they toss her into a dumpster.

At that point Kamone’s luck takes a turn for the better. Lucci, a successful drug dealer with a heart of gold, finds her in the dumpster and gets her medical help. Desperate to reunite with Paul and Ivory, Kamone insists on returning to Cookie’s place, and she also asks for a gun to defend herself from the men who raped her. When she returns to Cookie’s place, Cookie beats her and injures Ivory when Ivory attempts to go to Kamone’s aid. Kamone shoots Cookie and in the chaos a fire breaks out. Kamone, Ivory, and Paul escape to the street while Cookie is dying in the flames.

Next follows the only peaceful interlude in the novel. Lucci takes in the three siblings and treats them well. Eventually Kamone forces him to take her as his girlfriend. Things bust apart when Lucci has to leave town on business and his evil twin brother, David, who is a corrupt policeman, forces Kamone to take up cocaine and heroine and engage in sexual acts with women. David videotapes the action and gives Lucci the tape. Kamone ends up beat up and out on the street again. Eventually there is a happy resolution, but not without substantially more sex and violence. The dénouement occurs in a church.

Critical evaluation

My inclusion of Whore in this collection of young-adult titles requires an explanation. When a high school teacher friend heard I was reading young-adult literature, she said I should read some of the books that some of the African American girls in her 11th and 12th grade classes were reading. I told her to get me some titles, and Whore is what she came up with.

I read 45 pages when I first got the book, but it was devastatingly bleak and I put it aside. Eventually I decided to pick it up again because it’s a book that high school students are actually reading independently of their school assignments. Two limitations that make it difficult for me to review this book fairly. First, I have spent years avoiding violent films and books. It isn’t that I find violence upsetting emotionally so much as that I oppose violence for moral/political/intellectual reasons. I think we are what we read or watch, just like we are what we eat and, generally, we are what we do. Our experiences shape us, and I have no desire to be shaped by gratuitous violence. There’s enough real violence in the world that I don’t need to support pop culture expressions of violence that are designed primarily to earn a lot of money for the corporations that sell them. I realize, however, that most people are immersed in pop culture that reeks of violence, from music to video games to sports. Most people are more inured to violence in popular culture than I am. My negative reaction to the violence in Whore is not in sync with what many library patrons would feel about the book.

Second, I am sure that Lynch wrote Whore primarily for an African American audience. Who am I to judge what should be made available to members of a group that has a substantially different history and culture than mine? I notice that the San Francisco Public Library lists six copies of the book in their online catalog, and it would not be right for any book that a high school student was reading for leisure to be excluded from the public library because of cultural bias on the part of a librarian like me.

Tanika Lynch has written a gripping story, one that is definitely more a plot of action than a plot of character. The story would have been more interesting if the good twin-bad twin scenario had turned out to be a red herring, but the twists and turns of the plot were otherwise well staged.

About the author

Tanika Lynch was born in 1978 in Detroit. Her youth included similar difficulties to those of Kamone, and a trajectory that “landed her in prison on murder charges” by the time she was 16 years old (About Tanika Lynch, n.d.). In prison she pursued an education and became a writer. Her publisher’s Web lists Whore as her only novel (Tanika Lynch, n.d.).

Genre: African American, Life is hard, Crossover

Curriculum ties

The violence, sex, and profanity in Whore make it hard to imagine the book would be used in a high school classroom.

Book-talking ideas

No school librarian will buy this book, so it’s unlikely anyone will ever feature it in a book talk.

Reading level/interest age

Although the reading level is probably accessible for younger teens, I would hope that readers are at least 17 or 18 before they pick up this book.

Challenge issues

Lots of violence, lots of profanity, some heavy-duty sex, and a little bit of religion.

Responses

Since it is unlikely that any public or school library will ever put this book in the teen section, there’s not much need to plan for responses to challenges.

Why I chose to read this book

As I mentioned above, when a high school teacher friend heard I was reading young-adult literature, she said I should read some of the novels that some of the 11th and 12th grade African American girls in her classes were reading. I told her to get me some titles, and Whore is what she came up with.

References

About Tanika Lynch. (n.d.). Fantastic Fiction. Retrieved November 20, 2009, from http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/l/tanika-lynch/

Tanika Lynch. (n.d.). Triple Crown Publications. Retrieved November 20, 2009, from http://www.triplecrownpublications.com/author-31.html