Push [Hardcover]

Sapphire (Author)

Book Description

Release date: June 11, 1996

An electrifying first novel that shocks by its language, its circumstances, and its brutal honesty, Push recounts a young black street-girl's horrendous and redemptive journey through a Harlem inferno. For Precious Jones, 16 and pregnant with her father's child, miraculous hope appears and the world begins to open up for her when a courageous, determined teacher bullies, cajoles, and inspires her to learn to read, to define her own feelings and set them down in a diary.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Claireece Precious Jones endures unimaginable hardships in her young life. Abused by her mother, raped by her father, she grows up poor, angry, illiterate, fat, unloved and generally unnoticed. So what better way to learn about her than through her own, halting dialect. That is the device deployed in the first novel by poet and singer Sapphire. "Sometimes I wish I was not alive," Precious says. "But I don't know how to die. Ain' no plug to pull out. 'N no matter how bad I feel my heart don't stop beating and my eyes open in the morning." An intense story of adversity and the mechanisms to cope with it.

Precious is now a major motion picture based on the novel Push by Sapphire, starring Gabourey 'Gabby' Sidibe, Mo'Nique, Paula Patton, Mariah Carey, and Lenny Kravitz. Enjoy these images from the film, and click the thumbnails to see larger images.

---

From Publishers Weekly

With this much anticipated first novel, told from the point of view of an illiterate, brutalized Harlem teenager, Sapphire (American Dreams), a writer affiliated with the Nuyorican poets, charts the psychic damage of the most ghettoized of inner-city inhabitants. Obese, dark-skinned, HIV-positive, bullied by her sexually abusive mother, Clareece, Precious Jones is, at the novel's outset, pregnant for the second time with her father's child. (Precious had her first daughter at 12, named Little Mongo, "short for Mongoloid Down Sinder, which is what she is; sometimes what I feel I is. I feel so stupid sometimes. So ugly, worth nuffin.") Referred to a pilot program by an unusually solicitous principal, Precious comes under the experimental pedagogy of a lesbian miracle worker named, implausibly enough, Blue Rain. Under her angelic mentorship, Precious, who has never before experienced real nurturing, learns to voice her long suppressed feelings in a journal. As her language skills improve, she finds sustenance in writing poetry, in friendships and in support groups-one for "insect" survivors and one for HIV-positive teens. It is here that Sapphire falters, as her slim and harrowing novel, with its references to Harriet Tubman, Langston Hughes and The Color Purple (a parallel the author hints at again and again), becomes a conventional, albeit dark and unresolved, allegory about redemption. The ending, composed of excerpts from the journals of Precious's classmates, lends heightened realism and a wider scope to the narrative, but also gives it a quality of incompleteness. Sapphire has created a remarkable heroine in Precious, whose first-person street talk is by turns blisteringly savvy, rawly lyrical, hilariously pig-headed and wrenchingly vulnerable. Yet that voice begs to be heard in a larger novel of more depth and complexity. 150,000 first printing; first serial to the New Yorker; audio rights to Random; foreign rights sold to England, France, Germany, Holland, Portugal and Brazil.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; 1st edition (June 11, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679446265
• ISBN-13: 978-0679446262
• Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.8 x 7.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (671 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #191,310 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Sapphire was born in 1950 and spent her first twelve years on army bases in California and Texas. As a teenager she lived in South Philadelphia and Los Angeles. She graduated from City College in New York and received an MFA from Brooklyn College. From 1983 to 1993 she lived in Harlem, where she taught reading and writing to teenagers and adults. She lives in New York City.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

249 of 260 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Jessi's Review of Push April 28, 2000

By Jessica Gilbert

Format:Paperback

I must admit, when I first began reading Push, I was a little uncomfortable with the narrative perspective because it was so blunt in its descriptions. However, as hard of a time as I had with reading this text, I had an even harder time putting it down. Sapphire's novel forced me to face the reality of the verbally and sexually abusive life that Precious Jones was forced to live in. Unfortunately, Precious is not alone and Sapphire took the first step in acknowleding this problem by putting it into words, even though the words make some uncomfortable. Once I started reading and listening to Precious, I could not let go. Precious Jones is a sixteen year old girl, verbally and physically abused by her mother and sexually abused by her father. She gives birth to two children, her own father also being father of her children. However, this book is not only an attack on the abuse that occurs within a family. Sapphire also places blame on the educational system that sits back while their students are deprived of educational advancement because of their situations at home. There are so many children, like Precious, who want to learn but come to believe that they are dumb because no one took the time to examine the problem closer. I hurt for Precious because she had no self esteem, how could she when her father stripped everything from her, including her virginity, before she was even out of elementary school. I could not put the book down without knowing how she was going to rise above her circumstances. I got so wrapped up in this book, believing in Precious and everything she went through. Sapphire's book involved so many emotions and was so inspiring that I believe no student or teacher should go without reading this book.

60 of 65 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars You will never forget Precious Jones January 6, 2010

By Nelaine Sanchez VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

Claireece "Precious" Jones leads a tough life. She is abused by her mother, raped by her father, she is poor, angry, illiterate, fat, unloved and mostly unnoticed. She is pregnant by her father with her second child. She is 16 years old and still in Junior High School.

When a school administrator finds out that she is pregnant again - they quickly try to find another source of education for her. She is sent to alternative school. It is in this new school where Precious meets her new teacher, Ms. Rain. Ms. Rain is the first teacher who has ever taken the time to understand and really help Precious - along with some of her classmates. For the first time in her life, Precious feels like she belongs somewhere. She connects with her classmates, but especially with her teacher. Here she experiences the kindness of others, something completely foreign to her. She also comes to realize that she is not alone.

To be honest, I had never heard of this novel before I began to hear of the movie "Precious". I like to read the novel before I watch the movie, so when I began to read all the reviews on Precious I quickly ran out and purchased a copy of Push.

I really didn't know what to expect - but to be quite frank, I was really taken in by this novel. I did find it a little disturbing to read - here's a sample of how most of the book read:

" I was left back when I was twelve because I had a baby for my fahver. That was in 1983. I was out of school for a year. This is gonna be my second baby. My daughter got down sinder. She's retarded. I had got left back in the second grade too, when I was seven, cause I couldn't read (and I still peed on myself). I should be in the twelf' grade so I can gone 'n graduate. But I'm not. I'm in the ninfe grade".

Once I got past the grammar and spelling issues - I was basically moved to tears. Precious' struggle is so raw, disturbing, sad... and yet there was hope within it too. I could not put it down and read the whole thing in one sitting. The whole time you're reading this you can't help but think that there are people out there who have lived this sort of life - and it makes it even more heart-breaking to read.

This is a story that will stick with you long after you have put it down. It will open your eyes to the reality that these issues do occur and will make you rethink your own problems (which seem so insignificant when compared to a life like this). But as you close the cover you will come to realize that you will never forget Precious Jones.

50 of 54 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Reminder not to write off anyone as a lost cause. March 7, 2000

By Liesl English

Format:Paperback

This book was incredibly difficult to read due to the graphic manner in which the subject matter was relayed. But this same graphic manner made the book that much more powerful of a read.

Sapphire does a great job first having us identify the main character, Precious Jones, as other, someone separate from us, and then slowly pulling us in to get to know her. This technique allows us to recognize that someone in reality whom we identify as other can become someone we know and understand independent of our own personal situations.

Note to readers: make sure to read the poem in the beginning before and after reading Push and see how your understanding of that poem changes.