Customer Reviews

Black Ice

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I've read Black Ice atleast 7 times in the past 2 years because with each reading I continue to understand how my experiences at a predominantly white high school have shaped the person I have become. I can not remember the exact phrasing, but there is one passage in Black Ice that sums up how I feel about my high school experience. It goes something like this: If I had left St. Paul's School the same person who went there, there would have been no use in going. In other words, accept that you will be changed when you live through the alienation and self-inflicted loneliness of integrating schools in the Post-Jim Crow, Post Civil Rights Movement era. I wish that I would have read this book while I was still in high school. I would be able to better articulate to my friends and family what I was experiencing.

I've been wondering if the title has anything to do with the lake that Lorene visited in the story when she took the time to think about her life one night. Or maybe it is a visual reference to her heart, dark and cold because she, in her own words, had not loved enough during her teen-age years. Perhaps, it is a reference to the black ice on the roads that you have to watch out for in the winter...

This is a memoir by one of the first black female students at an elite prep school in New Hampshire, in the early 70's. The biggest psychological issue that come clearest through in this book, is the author's feelings of severe insecurity about operating in this rich white academic environment. She was ambitious to outshine everybody, of whatever race at the school and she ended up a neurotic mess, full of deep dissapointment that she did not. The author makes her deep confusion clear as she struggled with guilt about wheather she was betraying her working class black background to partake in the immense luxuries provided by the school. All the while so many hardworking working class people, like those she knew growing up, were deprived of that which the rich white snobs at the school took for granted. She seems to feel longer guilty about all this; she's proud of who she is and what she's gone through. Also of interest is her apparent deep fear of her white classmates, even though she developed many friendships.

One gets the impression that the author may not, when she published this book, have completely resolved her feelings.

For the most part, this is a well-told story (except towards the end). I particularly liked the contrast between her artistocratic life at St. Paul and her life when she came back to her working class home for the summer before senior year and worked at the Dinner. There she met Booker, the pot-smoking, tough-guy head cook and reveals him to be a tragic figure.

Black Ice by Lorene Carey is a beautifully written autobiographical narrative that speaks to the many problems of growing up in a complex world. It is the story of a young Philadelphian who attends a private boarding school in New Hampshire. She was accepted into St. Paul's shortly after it was opened to women and at a time when the school was interested in broadening its cultural base. Even with the uniqueness of the school experience, this story is about the trials and unpredictability of growing up. This is an excellent reading for high school students because of its accurate and authentic portrayal of the volatile years of high school. It is a true coming of age story with all of its uncertainties and complications. Students can identify with her journey toward knowledge of herself and the world; they can relate to her struggles in learning who she could trust, making strong decisions, and assuming responsibility for her actions. Her narration often includes her fears which can be liberating for high school students who may feel they are the only ones who have felt this fear. While it can be an affirming experience for students to read about familiar problems, an additional benefit of this coming of age story is the oppurtunity for witnessing the subtleties of racism in the modern world. Lorene Carey's frank narration about the confusion and fear she felt in the traditional world of St. Paul's challenges the reader to question the power of social institutions. Finally, Black Ice inspires meaningful discussions on the issues and complications facing students hoping to find their place in a demanding, changing world.

I wanted to like this book. I really did. I had heard Lorene Cary speak at a conference, and she was incredibly inspiring. The way she spoke, she sounded like an amazing writer, and so I was excited to pick up this book, the first work by Cary that I have had a chance to read. It simply did not live up to my expectations.

Cary does do some great things with language in this memoir. Many descriptions are beautifully poetic, and the metaphor of black ice is one that will stick with me. But there were also many flaws in this book, the greatest being that I feel as though she did not do enough to let the reader in. Perhaps I expect more from memoirs, but one of the reasons I enjoy reading them so much is for the insights writers share when they look back on the experiences they choose to write about. Memoir can allow for great intimacy between writer and reader, and Cary just does not do that here. Perhaps distancing herself was intentional, but it was not a tactic that worked for me. She does a good job describing the black female experience in a world that was previously all-white, all-male, but I feel like she could have gone deeper, as far as how she personally felt about the particular aspects of her life that she chose to share. Coming-of-age stories are ones I naturally gravitate to, as there is so much emotion to explore in that adolescent experience, and in my opinion, Cary only skimmed the surface. She couldn't break through the black ice the book is named for, so the experiences she writes about seem a bit watered-down.

I also had a hard time keeping track of some of the characters. Many of her schoolmates in particular appeared so fleetingly, and weren't developed enough, so that I found myself paging backwards to remind myself who some of them were. Her family members were a bit more memorable, and I thought the stories about her grandparents were particularly of interest, but I would have liked to have known even more about her relationships with them. There were just too many missed opportunities, and so while this book is a quick read, and is valuable for the perspective of a young black female that Cary shares with us, in the end I can only rate this book as average.

Combining a quick sense of humor with a gentle sensitivity to the tragedies of adolescence, Ms. Cary allows us to accompany her as one of the first young black women admitted to St. Paul's School in the early '70s. She is exploring who she is and who she wants to be and at the same time must cope with the alienation from, and gradual collapse of, her family hundreds of miles away. Ms. Cary writes in an unadorned, compelling style which quietly demands the reader's attention. Black Ice offers a poignant, sometimes frightening, but always exquisite tale of a young woman's determined quest for her place in life

I too had to read this book for school. Once, in the summer going into my freshman year, and again during my junior year. On both occassions, I found that this was a delightful book. The word choices are quite appropriate, and if the words are too big for your vocabulary, then read with a dictionary. I thought that this was a poignant memoir about the early days of integration. As a reader--amazingly, as a white reader--I was very empathtic to the challenges that Ms. Cary overcame. If after all you came away with after reading this book is that it was boring and inconsequential, read it again. Reading for school may not be on the top of my list for fun things to do, but if you forget you're doing homework and yourself to enter the atmosphere of the book, then there is no way you cannot enjoy it. Black Ice is a very powerful and moving book. In recounting her own adolsence, Cary helps people in their teen years make sense of all that is happening to them. She also allows others who have left those years, to remember their own adolescence. There is much to be gained from reading this book, and nothing to lose. I guess if you are a thoughtless person, who does not want to know the history of this country, then this book is not for you. But if you have a compassionate bone in your body, you will learn and grow from this amazing book.

Black Ice by Lorene Cary takes place during the late seventies. Libby is the main character and her story begins when her next-door neighbor tells her about an all boys boarding school who is deciding to accept girls. Libby discussed the school with her mom. Her mom thought it would be a great opportunity. However, at first, Libby thought differently about it but she accepted the opportunity to make a new path in her life. Therefore, she called the dean of admission and told him she would love to attend his school. Would you like to know what happened during her rigorous journey at boarding school? To find out you would have to read the book.
I recommend Black Ice to any student who enjoys books about learning experiences. Although, some of the content was difficult you can use your context clues to help you understand what the author's meaning was. To grasp a full concept of this novel you have to read and critically think about it. If you are a type of reader, who just flies through works of any kind and does not take the time to truly comprehend this is not the manuscript for you.
I enjoyed Black Ice but not as much as I thought, I would. While, this novel kept me wondering and concerned about how Libby would turn out. It just did not catch my attention when I began to read it. However, many other students might enjoy Black Ice more than I did. Many students like you can relate to the reality of this book. It taught me if your teacher gives you a suggestion about how many classes, you should take you or how you should do any type of work, you should really consider their advice. If the teacher is taking the time to give you a suggestion, they care about you results in your education. Libby is a regular teenage student. So her story on can help students that are trying to stay on the right road or trying to find the right road.

Black Ice is a badly written memoir. Though I am an avid reader, I found myself struggling to get through this work. Not only does it lack insight into her situation, Cary consistently practiced poor word choice in her writing, leaving the reader wondering what her intention was. I also question Cary's editors at Vintage Books--why did they allow her to leave in page after page of lackluster prose describing the minutia of her life? (i.e., pp.60-61 in which Cary describes dropping her soap) I am shocked that reviewer Arnold Rampersad and the Washington Post Book World placed Cary in the same league as Maya Angelou and Richard Wright. Having recently read Ron Suskind's Hope in the Unseen which was a fabulous nonfiction book about a young African American's struggle to fit into life at Brown University, I was disappointed that this coming-of-age offered such little insight into Cary's inner world.

This book is just spectacular. It was a class requirement, and I must say that my teacher selected a great choice. As a teenage girl, I believe that every teenage girl should be required to read a book like this one. It actually allows you to envision some of the many obstacles that yong girls face in light of growing up.

Black Ice
Review by Ana Santos


I would like all my peers to read Black Ice written by Lorene Cary, because it talks about her life in general how she was sent to a high school that she did not know anything about. My peers should know that the book is an autobiography so it is talking about her teenage life in high school. This is a book for peers that like to know about others peoples life, how they changed, and what affected them. If you like, these books I recommend you to read this text. Lorene was kind of forced or pushed to go to St. Paul boarding school. In addition, these are how her high school years were going and how much she accomplished. For example, Lorene was obligated to have intimate relations with her boyfriend, but she did not do anything about the fact that she was forced. In addition, Lorene used drugs, but she quitted before she became addicted. After all, Lorene made great choices that helped her graduate fro St. Paul. From my impression, the autobiography is not so hard to read because you can understand what it saying. The texts portion is short; however, it takes time to comprehend the significance of "Black Ice." You can read this text twice and you will get the significance of the text. I think every one would accept to read this autobiography. The book has to be read critically. I personally think my peers should read with a lot of time.