What Is the What

Jan 02, 2008 Len rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: everyone in the human race

If you know me at all, you know I read a lot. So I don't take these reviews lightly. Here goes: What is the What is without a doubt one of the best books I have ever read!

The story of Valentino Achak Deng, a so-called Lost Boy of the Sudan, is so moving that after reading the book I went to his web site and signed up for information on how I can help the cause. Dave Eggers, who is easily one of my favorite fiction writers, has donated the proceeds of the book to a foundation co-founded by he and...more If you know me at all, you know I read a lot. So I don't take these reviews lightly. Here goes: What is the What is without a doubt one of the best books I have ever read!

The story of Valentino Achak Deng, a so-called Lost Boy of the Sudan, is so moving that after reading the book I went to his web site and signed up for information on how I can help the cause. Dave Eggers, who is easily one of my favorite fiction writers, has donated the proceeds of the book to a foundation co-founded by he and Valentino (www.valentinoachackdeng.org).

The writing is brilliant and the story is compelling...but I think what makes the book so great for me is the sheer tragedy of this boy's life and the unbelieveable sense of courage and optimism he showed throughout a life that would have caused most people to simply give up. Valentino's courage is beyond belief. As his story unfolds, it's unimaginable that he could have survived and it's heartbreaking how at each turn things continued to get worse. His survival is a mystery that will never be solved...yet here he is as a young adult doing everything he can to help the world learn from his experience.

The book was also a great history lesson about Sudan and Africa in general and gives the reader great insight into the troubles in Darfur today. If the world does not learn from this story then perhaps we are doomed as a species.

Finally, though the story is Valentino's, the writing is all Eggers. He could have easily played the story as a straight biography, but instead Eggers weaves Valentino's life together in a beautiful way -- going back and forth between his time in Africa and his new life in Atlanta. And while his life in Africa was indeed a horror, his life in the U.S. is not much better and perhaps the biggest lesson of the book -- we have tried to help these Lost Boys but we are far from perfect and have made many mistakes as a society.

It's ironic that this morning I awoke to a front page story in the Arizona Republic about a birthday celebration for Arizona's Lost Boys (there are about 500 Sudanese boys living in the Valley). They all celebrate their birthday on Jan. 1 because they have no idea when they were really born.

It's also ironic that I finished this book around the same time as I saw The Kite Runner. When I read The Kite Runner, and even Hosseini's second novel A thousand Splendid Suns, I thought life was terrible for the Afghans -- but Valentino's real story makes the fictional story of the boys in The Kite Runner seem tame by comparison. But together these stories make me feel both lucky to live in America and at the same time ashamed that the world can let things like this happen.

As I sat reading Valentino's story on my sofa, I thought here is a boy who has experienced things I couldn't even imagine, while I sit in my 2100 square foot home with a fridge full of food, two cars, a happy and relatively healthy family, casually spending $4 for a cup of coffee and throwing out more food each day than Valentino ate in a month. It reaffirms my political views and teaches me to be thankful for what I have -- and more importantly that I have a profound responsibility as a citizen of the world to help those who are less fortunate. If you think that makes me a bleeding heart liberal than I'm proud to wear that badge.

Read this book. It will change your life.(less)

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Jun 26, 2008 Sergei rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It takes a certain and rare kind of writer to make a story about civil war, genocide, and a refugee crisis boring and unreadable; that writer, specifically, is Dave Eggers. It's not that I don't understand the purpose that this book serves - just as we import the Third World's raw resources to fuel our own material greed, so must we import their tragedies to break up the monotony of our lives. My question is - can't we get better books to do it?

First of all, the voice is terrible. At points it r...more It takes a certain and rare kind of writer to make a story about civil war, genocide, and a refugee crisis boring and unreadable; that writer, specifically, is Dave Eggers. It's not that I don't understand the purpose that this book serves - just as we import the Third World's raw resources to fuel our own material greed, so must we import their tragedies to break up the monotony of our lives. My question is - can't we get better books to do it?

First of all, the voice is terrible. At points it reads like a parody of an American trying to imitate an African (oh, wait, it is, although Dave Eggers has probably at least met some, so I don't know what his excuse is). Take the very first sentence: "I have no reason not to answer the door so I answer the door." What, did the Sudanese civil war rob fake-Deng of the ability to use pronouns? The language is stilted and formal in a very amateurish way, not at all the way a young man talks, and for no good reason.

Second, why is it that going through a capital-T Tragedy means that none of the characters are allowed to have personalities? This happens all the time in fiction about genocide. No one is allowed to be cowardly, or funny, or petty, or squabbling - everyone must be stoic and long-suffering, because they are Noble Victims, and that is how Noble Victims are supposed to act (in real life, many people who go through tragedy tend to develop dark, savage senses of humor, but you wouldn't know that from reading this). After all, you can only be a nuanced and articulated character if you grew up in the suburbs of America, preferably with an unhappy childhood and a substance abuse problem in college.

Third, Eggers' writing is just flat and boring. Take, for instance, Eggers describing an air raid:

"But the plane returned a few minutes later, and soon after, there was a whistle. Dut screamed to us that we needed to run but did not tell us where. We ran in a hundred directions and two boys chose the wrong direction. They ran for the shelter of a large tree and this is where the bomb struck."

That's it? One of the most intense and terrifying things that can happen to you in life, and this is the treatment it gets? The plane returned and soon there was a whistle? Eggers writes like he just wants to get it over with. Which I don't exactly blame him for.

There is a bit of unintentional humor - when, in the present story, Deng tells Americans that he's from Sudan, but not Darfur, they quickly lose interest, because Americans only care about the foreign trouble spots that are hip to care about. Dumb, trendy Americans! But the real joke, of course, is that concurrent with the Sudanese civil war was/is the one in the Congo, which dwarfs the Sudanese conflict in horror, body count, and anything else you can think of. But Eggers, along with the rest of the world, doesn't care, because it's messy and complicated, whereas in Sudan you have Good Guys and Bad Guys. Much easier to understand - and much easier to sell books about.

All that having been said, Eggers is a genius; just not a literary genius. He is a genius for pulling the ultimate bait and switch: take someone else's story and then become the hero of it. Because that is who the hero is here, Dave Eggers, even though he doesn't appear once in the actual plot. After all, young Valentino's story would have remained untold - if it were not for the Deus Ex Maquina of Dave Eggers, who tells it like no one else can. Remember Eggers' first book, "A Staggering Work of Heartbreaking Genius?" That title wasn't cutesy and ironic, it was literal. That's what Eggers wanted to write, and now he's given you one. So what if the heartbreak is someone else's?

If you think I'm being too harsh, then ask yourself this: why didn't Eggers just write a nonfiction book, or a straight up biography of Deng? At points, I'm tempted to think that it's because he couldn't be bothered to do some basic research (i.e., the repeated references to "Darfurians"; "Darfur" means "The Land of the Fur," the Fur being the people that live there, so this is sort of like referring to Polish people as "The People From The Land of the Polish." Also, the 1997 death of Princess Diana for some reason seems to come in the plot well after the 1998 African embassy bombings). The answer is that Eggers needs to hide behind someone else's genuine suffering, because that defuses any criticism of his own lifeless, droning prose. Insult Eggers, and you're insulting the sanctity of the Sudanese Lost Boys' pain and suffering. Point out the platitudes that Eggers shovels out in lieu of the real questions, which generally do not have easy answers or any answers at all, and you're heartless and callow. It's not a hard shell game that Eggers plays here - but there is none better at it than him. (less)

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Jun 07, 2012 Rachel rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

GREAT STORY, NOT-SO-GREAT BOOK!

This took me THREE MONTHS to finish!!! I did read other books in the meantime, but believe me, I wouldn't have dragged my feet on this one if the storytelling hadn't been so TERRIBLY AWFUL!

Examples of STORIES told particularly badly ....
a) The drama teacher Miss Gladys and the Dominics
b) The romance between Achak and Tabitha
c) Life at Kakuma
d) The story of Maria, the girl who called him Sleeper
e) The walk from Pinyudo to Kakuma
f) The play times with Achak and the...more

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view all 7 comments

Robin Rachel, I think that you have a misunderstanding why this book was published as fiction rather than as non-fiction. I think Eggers chose to publish it...more Rachel, I think that you have a misunderstanding why this book was published as fiction rather than as non-fiction. I think Eggers chose to publish it as fiction, because there was no way to verify all the accounts and recollections of Valentino Achak Deng. It has nothing to do with whether or not Eggers wanted to fictionalize and embellish the story or not. And Eggers was not trying to be Achak Deng, he was trying to write from Deng's point of view. I have worked for refugee resettlement agencies in the US and even the one mentioned in the book that resettled Deng. And I have personally worked with Sudanese refugees and other African refugees in the US. I can say that the conditions and descriptions of Kakuma and Dadaab refugee camps sounded quite accurate to me. Also, the description of the various ethnic groups in the camp like the Sundanese, Congolese, Ethiopian, Eritreans, and Somali groups not getting along and creating a cast system in the camp also sounds very true. Additionally, the description of his life in the US and living in low-income housing is certainly true for most refugees trying to make a new life in the US. The reason why the real Deng most likely didn't write this autobiography himself is probably because his English skills and writing skills are not that great and he felt that he needed someone else like Eggers to help him give a voice to his experiences.

Additionally, although I agree that it is hard to believe that people like Deng can go through so much suffering and pain and still come out of it believing in God and calling themselves Christians. I'm not sure that I could say the same for myself if I were in his position. It amazes me what atrocities and cruelty humans can inflict on each other. Sure, I wish he would have expanded on his philosophical beliefs. But I also believe that the reason why he didn't is because that is not what the story was about. He is trying to tell his story and get his point across not have a philosophical discussion on religion or politics.(less)
Jan 17, 2013 07:28am

Rachel Hi Robyn,

Sorry, it seems you have misunderstood my review! Sorry about that. It seems you think that I was criticizing the book for making the conditi...more Hi Robyn,

Sorry, it seems you have misunderstood my review! Sorry about that. It seems you think that I was criticizing the book for making the conditions seem too harsh or unrealistic, or that I thought the author (Dave Eggers) embellished the story too much? No, that was not the case at all. I was saying that since it was FICTION, Eggers could have actually made the story riveting and fun and interesting. As an example, the story of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan describes a historical situation every bit as horrific as what happened to the Lost Boys in Sudan ... it's FICTION, TOO, and yet based on real events ... but it's wonderful writing and a pleasure to read. Meanwhile the story of Valentino Achak Deng is written in a style that is so dull and uninviting, most of the time, I had to force myself to go on reading each word on the page. If it were non-fiction, I'd give the author a free pass on dull and boring, but it's FICTION ... he could have made it as exciting and interesting as he wanted!

And no, I don't have a hard time believing "that people like Deng can go through so much suffering and pain and still come out of it believing in God and calling themselves Christians." I have no disbelief about how screwed up and cruel people are, because I have experienced it personally. Just so you know! My complaint about the Christian thing is that if it truly was an AUTOBIOGRAPHY, with as much inner thought dialog as what Dave Eggers provides .... I think the central character would have been mentioning more often how he was praying to GOD to save his life during certain times, and instead he was just calmly relating these horrific events, rarely mentioning God at all.

For example, if I run to catch a bus, I might tell the story of how I ran and ran, praying the whole time that God will keep me safe and help me not get run over by cars or bicycles as I hurried to my destination, and when I got there, I just barely caught the bus, and I said, "THANK GOD I made it!" That sort of thing. Basically, when you believe in God, it permeates your inner thoughts fairly often. You go outside and think "Thank GOD for this gorgeous day!!!" You have dinner with friends and think "Thank GOD for these wonderful friends I have!" Or something bad happens ... your best friend dies; you think about his spirit coming with you and communicating with you from the afterlife. You can do all of this without having a "philosophical discussion on religion or politics." When you believe in God, it's just a normal part of your inner dialog. You don't have all of these major things, good and bad happening, with TONS OF INNER THOUGHT DIALOG, none of it ever having to do with God. Then ... if once in awhile you stop in a Catholic Church or something, it seems very out of character. It's like "Hey, Dave Eggers has put us inside your brain and forced us to read 600+ pages of your very boring inner thought dialog ... and then once in awhile he says you're this very religious Catholic ... well, we don't buy it !!! How come you hardly ever thought about God during all of those 600 pages if you care so much about being a Catholic?"

I'm not saying that I doubt that VAD is a dedicated Catholic. No doubt he is. But I think Dave Eggers made an error when he neglected to make VAD's belief in God a more regular part of his inner thought dialog. I believe people who believe in God do tend to call upon God pretty often, especially when going through such devastating events. So ... I don't know, maybe Dave Eggers is an atheist and therefore didn't "get" that aspect of VAD, or he didn't understand how important such details would be, to making his story believable. I definitely think he erred in that aspect of his writing the book.(less)
updated Jan 22, 2013 08:15pm

Dec 16, 2010 Paul rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history-will-teach-us-nothing, novels

TOO MUCH, AND NOT ENOUGH : A PARADOX

With her open and confident sexuality, she was the constant igniter of everything flammable within us

Hmm, if this Sudanese refugee & now American Valentine Achak Deng can turn a phrase like that, how come he needs Dave Eggars to shape his book and cop the byline? Okay, maybe he can't, maybe those delightful sentences are pure Dave. So what about this:

"I had feared for a long time that secretly Tabitha was well versed in the ways of love and that the momen...more TOO MUCH, AND NOT ENOUGH : A PARADOX

With her open and confident sexuality, she was the constant igniter of everything flammable within us

Hmm, if this Sudanese refugee & now American Valentine Achak Deng can turn a phrase like that, how come he needs Dave Eggars to shape his book and cop the byline? Okay, maybe he can't, maybe those delightful sentences are pure Dave. So what about this:

"I had feared for a long time that secretly Tabitha was well versed in the ways of love and that the moment we were alone she would want to move too quickly."

Now this sounds like the authentic voice of an African trying to speak of delicate matters in his second language to me, and comes off as horribly stilted, but understandably so. Okay, so no Dave Eggars there, that's pure Valentine. Now since it's the clunky uber-sincere stilted voice which tells 98% of this long tale, why is this book not bylined like all those celeb autobiographies - "by Valentine Achak Deng, as told to Dave Eggars". Does this matter much? Well, at the point where the ventriloquism starts to creep you out, yes it does.

As everyone knows, this is a long catalogue of ghastly horrors suffered in Africa interspersed with a long catalogue of banal indignities suffered in Atlanta: "As we swam across the river I saw a crocodile swim by with a boy I knew slightly in its mouth... I was unfulfilled being the receptionist at a gym and I deeply regretted not being accepted by the Jesuit college of my choice... when I woke up I found my closest friend had died in the night...I gradually realised my girlfriend was playing fast and loose with other gentlemen..." etc etc. This flipfloppery clashed dissonantly in my ears like an untuned church bell, but nevertheless is it not profoundly human? As soon as the crocodile lets you go you start bitching about how his fangs ruined your only good Hugo Boss shirt. In Art Spiegelman's brilliant memoir "Maus" - another tale of horror told to someone who then tells it to us - the difficulties of Art's relationship with his survivor father loom just as large in the book as the atrocities of Auschwitz. Is this tastelessness? No, it's life as she is lived. I mean, is there a God? Do you think this jacket, or the other one? But would God allow such evil just for the sake of human free will, I mean, does that justify all this agony? So are you saying the brown shoes? Really?

WHY THIS AND WHY NOT THAT?

Three stars, not four or five? Well, there were so many aspects covered, great swathes of I confess tedious detail I could have done without, and yet so many other things not included - why this, why that? How? And of course, what? (Or more likely in this book WHAT??!!) And yet it was very compelling. Valentine is indeed a modern Ancient Mariner compelled to stop us wedding guests and fix us with a powerful gaze so that we have to hear his dreadful over-politely-phrased tale to the end.

It would take a whole long essay to discuss the politics of this intensely political book. Was the airlift of the Lost Boys to America a "failed experiment"? Can the West ever really do anything about these decades-long conflicts in Africa? And further - is one lot of humans (here, the Sudanese Arabs) really wholly evil and another group (here the Sudanese Dinka) complete and utter innocent victims? Is this Valentine Achak Deng's whole story, or as I suspect do we now need another 537 pages of footnotes giving us all the context that's missing from this almost essential but extremely frustrating book? (less)

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Mar 27, 2012 Stephanie rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: lit, 2012

Now that was a lot of information. Too much.

Valentino Achak Deng is one of the lost boys of the civil war in Sudan. He survived a genocide, walking from Sudan to Ethiopia where boys were getting picked off one by one by lions in the night. Crocodiles, vultures, dysentery, soldiers tying to blow him up, starvation, a car accident, and a robbery in Atlanta after being relocated to the US.

Life has not been easy for Valentino. Yet he somehow keeps going with a positivity that is hard to believe. The...more

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Aug 23, 2007 Elizabeth rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

ugh.... I had read Heartbreaking Work and did not enjoy it, but I thought I'd give Eggers another chance. I'm plodding through this book and have been since March. I'm sad about it, because I'm interested by the subject matter. Oh well, lots of people disagree with me, so "you don't have to take MY word for it!"

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Feb 28, 2008 Nathaniel rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: africa

When so much hype and reputation converge on such a complex and sensitive topic only to receive unchecked praise from the American publishing industry and profitable sales, I fear disaster, choir-preaching and the perpetration of harmful stereotypes. Despite my interest in African literature, in African conflicts and in the way that the developed world engages with Africa, I have been avoiding this book since I learned of its existence. A friend of mine who has lived and worked in Sudan vouched...more When so much hype and reputation converge on such a complex and sensitive topic only to receive unchecked praise from the American publishing industry and profitable sales, I fear disaster, choir-preaching and the perpetration of harmful stereotypes. Despite my interest in African literature, in African conflicts and in the way that the developed world engages with Africa, I have been avoiding this book since I learned of its existence. A friend of mine who has lived and worked in Sudan vouched unreservedly for its authenticity and inoffensiveness and lent me her copy; I’m not mad at her.

Dave Eggers more or less avoids cheapening his subject, weakening his message or losing credibility for the duration of a book comprised of stories that would tempt a narrator with less integrity to deploy every variety of manipulative, sensationalist, suspenseful and tear-jerking prose. The result is an unflinching, straight-forward, trustworthy and revealing testimony. I have no doubt that “What is the What” has communicated more deeply about the reality of Sudan’s recent atrocities than most other products in any media. And I consider this more of an ethical accomplishment than a literary one.

Modern pragmatist philosophers (such as Richard Rorty) contend that one of the best ways to act ethically is to work towards expanding the circles of empathy of as many people as you can. They suggest doing this by telling stories from new perspectives that familiarize and humanize marginalized and oppressed peoples and by creating ethnographies that do the same work on a more scholarly level. A book like this is supposed to raise awareness, to sensitize people and to encourage action. To the extent that this book makes it harder for people to be idle or disinterested in the face of circumstances like those in the South of Sudan, it is successful; to the extent that it prompts people to take action about such circumstances, it is impressively so.

Now, I’m not thrilled with Eggers’s decision to play a little game with the genre—calling this both an autobiography and a novel—and I’m not convinced by the reasons that are given for his doing so. Nor am I entirely comfortable with the narrative tactic of making Achak Deng directly address different parts of his story to whichever American seems to be disappointing him in the contemporary portion of “What is the What.” As readers quickly discover, the chapters of Deng’s tale that transpire in Sudan, Ethiopia and Kenya are related by him (in his mind, somewhat accusingly) over the course of less than two days to Americans with whom he is interacting. It is all rather obvious that the Americans he addresses are just the cogs in the machinery of our populace, the people who refuse agency and responsibility, the people who are passive accomplices to the neglect of people like Deng—whether they struggle at dead end jobs, making change at our supermarkets or whether they struggle to survive in crude structures built of trash amidst vulnerable refugees on the far side of earth. It’s an interesting tactic, clearly built to abolish narrative distance and to refresh a sense of accountability; but it can seem a bit forced.

I don’t think the prose warrants excerpting or stylistic analysis, nor am I tempted to highlight any particular episodes of Deng’s life. There are charming bits to the story, therapeutic moments of good fortune and humanity and there are scarring accounts of human behavior at its worst. The book is worth reading for its even keeled navigation of these moments, for the insight it offers into life in a refugee camp and for the mirror that it holds up to the United States as it fails to approximate the ideal of “sanctuary.” Respect to Dave Eggers for donating the profits he could have made from this endeavor to the cause of other Lost Boys from Sudan.
(less)

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Feb 03, 2008 Myles rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is the fictionalized autobiography of real-life Sudanese refugee Valentino Achak Deng, who grew up mostly in a refugee camp in Kenya (where he lived for 10 years!)

Eggers weaves a present tense with the story of Valentino's childhood in Sudan. In the present tense Valentino is getting robbed and beaten in his Atlanta apartment because he trusted the people who came to the door. Finally when he is discovered bleeding on the floor of his apartment by his roommate, he is taken to the hospi...more This book is the fictionalized autobiography of real-life Sudanese refugee Valentino Achak Deng, who grew up mostly in a refugee camp in Kenya (where he lived for 10 years!)

Eggers weaves a present tense with the story of Valentino's childhood in Sudan. In the present tense Valentino is getting robbed and beaten in his Atlanta apartment because he trusted the people who came to the door. Finally when he is discovered bleeding on the floor of his apartment by his roommate, he is taken to the hospital where it takes ages for him to get help. As all of that is happening, in his mind Valentino tells the story of his life to his robbers, to the unhelpful people at the hospital, to the people who walk into the health club where he works at the front desk, and to the readers of the book.

It's difficult to imagine that one man has lived through so much! Paramilitaries backed by the Sudanese government attacked the village of Marial Bai where the little boy Valentino lived, and he ended up walking all the way to Ethiopia with a group of other "lost boys". He did not know if his parents were alive or dead for many years, until he was an adult. The walk to Ethiopia nearly killed Valentino, and did kill many of the other boys. After living in a refugee camp for several years in Ethiopia, with tens of thousands of others, he was forced to flee a massacre at that camp back across southern Sudan to northern Kenya, where he ended up living in another refugee camp for an entire decade. Along the way, boys and girls and men and women died from animals, insects, bombings, shootings, hunger, thirst. For someone who didn't know much about that world, some of this is surprising, such as how long refugees are trapped as refugees, when "temporary" camps become seemingly permanent. Kakuma (the camp in Kenya) is a place where Valentino and the refugees could not provide for themselves, owing to the poor quality of the land. It really is like being in prison.

For me, the saddest part of the entire story by far is the fate of Valentino's love Tabitha, another refugee from Sudan who ended up in Seattle. It's strange that I would feel that way, given how many terribly sad things happen in this book. I guess I would like to believe that among the survivors love is possible.

Names are a notable part of this story. Valentino picks up names like "Gone Far" (for having walked the farthest to Ethiopia) and "Sleeping" (for having decided to stop walking and die on the road, only to be saved by a girl who won't let him stay there) and "Dominic" (because his drama teacher couldn't remember names). The refugees come up with clever nicknames like "Potential Food" for the leader who describes every empty field as potential food (mockingly they point to every rock and every tire as potential food).

Finally there is the question of What is the What? The What is a reference to a Dinka story, where God offers the Dinka people a choice between the cattle they see before them, and the What (the unknown). Of course the Dinka chose the cattle which gave them life (abundance, etc). At the end of the book Valentino gives a speech that frames that choice as a mistake of timidity, although I find myself disagreeing with that thought. Abundance seems like a decent choice if it's offered! But Valentino's life offered no abundance. He was thrown about from one What to another. Coming to America was the first time in his life where he chose the What -- the first time he was free to make his own choice.

After finishing the book, I remembered a point earlier in the story where Tabitha and Valentino traveled to Nairobi (where they share their first kiss), and she urged him to run away from their group and not return to the refugee camp. He wouldn't do it, because to run away would mean other refugees would never again be permitted visits outside the camp. I find myself wishing he'd have listened to her and chosen that What instead of the What at the end of the book (coming to America). I wonder if he ever feels that way.

You can visit Valentino's foundation here:
http://www.valentinoachakdeng.org/(less)

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Feb 13, 2013 Scott Axsom rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

On the cosmic scale of noble publishing ventures, “What is the What” must rank near the top. Though billed as a novel, the book is the story of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan by the name of Valentino Achak Deng and, though written by Dave Eggers, all proceeds from the book go to Deng's foundation. Noble.

Deng’s story is a harrowing one. A brief and characteristic example comes after he buries a friend during the long march (spoiler-redacted);

”When I was finished, I told (him) that I was sorry. I
...more On the cosmic scale of noble publishing ventures, “What is the What” must rank near the top. Though billed as a novel, the book is the story of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan by the name of Valentino Achak Deng and, though written by Dave Eggers, all proceeds from the book go to Deng's foundation. Noble.

Deng’s story is a harrowing one. A brief and characteristic example comes after he buries a friend during the long march (spoiler-redacted);

”When I was finished, I told (him) that I was sorry. I was sorry that I had not known how sick he was. That I had not found a way to keep him alive. That he could not say goodbye to his mother and father, that only I would know where his body lay. It was a broken world, I knew then, that would allow a boy such as me, to bury a boy such as (him) “

The subject, and the telling, clearly hold immeasurable dramatic power, so why did I give the book three stars?

This was my first foray into Dave Eggers territory, so I can’t say with any erudition whether the voice, as some have complained, is that of the author rather than his subject - that’s one of the problems with writing a book like this, I guess. What I can say is the voice is extraordinarily believable and it tells a story that borders on the unimaginable. Truth, as they say, is stranger than fiction or, in this case, considerably more inhumane and I found the revelations of abject disregard for humanity as compelling as I found them disturbing.

Nor did I have the usual complaints about the story; that it’s too damnatory of American culture, or that it’s too saccharine. My most significant complaint would simply be that it was too long. I love an epic story but this one just seemed to get weaker with the telling. I feel as though this should be one of the more important books I’ve read - the tale it tells is one that so needed to be told in such a thorough, personal fashion - but the portrayal eventually rendered itself almost commonplace. Perhaps the author tamped down his inclinations for drama when, in this case, more was called for.

If there’s one area where this “novel” shines, though, that would be in its unadorned depiction of mortal desire. Deng is stripped of everything but his corporeality and, still, he possesses universal, intrinsic human longings: to be loved, to find kinship and, most important of all, to be recognized as real. The story of Valentino Achak Deng is in some ways a classic one, of total loss and the noble struggle to regain the barest foundation of his humanity; the simple recognition that his existence matters. Eggers chronicles his saga with humor and pathos, tenderness and dignity, and that alone may be reason enough to read “What is the What”.(less)

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Oct 24, 2007 Irfon-kim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks

I finished listening to "What is the What" by Dave Eggers, narrated by Dion Graham, a couple of days ago, but didn't have a chunk of quiet time to write about it until now. It's the somewhat fictionalized biography of Valentino Achak Deng, a young boy in the Sudan at the outbreak of the civil war, through to his adulthood as a refugee in America.

The story is epic in scope, but is told in a very personal, down-to-earth fashion. You're as likely to hear about the title character's first fumbling a...more I finished listening to "What is the What" by Dave Eggers, narrated by Dion Graham, a couple of days ago, but didn't have a chunk of quiet time to write about it until now. It's the somewhat fictionalized biography of Valentino Achak Deng, a young boy in the Sudan at the outbreak of the civil war, through to his adulthood as a refugee in America.

The story is epic in scope, but is told in a very personal, down-to-earth fashion. You're as likely to hear about the title character's first fumbling attempts at typing or his volunteer guard duty of a neighbour's bicycle as to hear about tanks and land-mines. This really anchors the story and helps the focus remain on telling the story of Valentino, and telling the wider story through his story rather than making it about the wider situation with his story being a tacked-on footnote. The material itself is striking, and eye-opening. Even if you've been aware of what happened in the Sudan, I expect hearing about what the people endured as part of the story of an individual life would still be eye-opening. I wasn't that well-informed, so it was certainly interesting for me.

Despite the excellent source matter, however, the story is somewhat crudely told. While Eggers has a fantastic sense of voice and really personalizes all of the characters, the overall handling of the plot arc felt clumsy and gimmicky at times, and the way the historical material is introduced through the Valentino's present-day inner monologue addressed at various people in his daily life gets to be a tired trick after a while. Also, the attempt to include everything possible about the Sudanese people's experiences in this one person's individual story leads to a certain straining of plausibility after a while that's only partly explained away by having the other characters themselves remark that God must have something against him. The pacing of the context switches seems slightly off in a way that often leaves you wanting to hear more about the part you're not hearing about now, whichever part that may be. There are a couple of things which are introduced multiple times during the course of the story in a way that seems more accidental than artistic, and oddly, given that at several points the story felt a little long, the book eventually just sort of ... stops, dropping the story in an unsatisfying fashion.

All of that said, the source material is so compelling that even a muddled rendition of it provides for an extremely worthwhile read, and Dion Graham does a riveting job as the narrator, with excellent voices for most of the characters (his female characters become a little generic, but I haven't heard many male narrators do great women, so I'll forgive him that) and a fantastic command of the cadence and character of the principal character's voice that makes the book wonderful to hear.

Overall, the writing is matter-of-fact enough and the delivery of the material is somewhat ho-hum (other than the excellent audio production) in a way that makes it hard for me to jump up and down waving my arms in the air about this book, but I definitely still think that it's a worthwhile listen, probably even more gripping in audio than on the printed page.(less)

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Aug 23, 2007 Miss. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Dave Eggers tells Achack's story much like you would hear it if you had befriended the Sudanese refugee yourself. this book is like a conversation with a good friend. you start where you are. "hello, how are you, i am being robbed at gun point". you move back to the begining. "this is where i am from, the world was dust, we knew it to be Sudan, there was no more". but, to explain the begining, and to get to the end, you often have laughs in the middle. "successful with women". eventually a life...more Dave Eggers tells Achack's story much like you would hear it if you had befriended the Sudanese refugee yourself. this book is like a conversation with a good friend. you start where you are. "hello, how are you, i am being robbed at gun point". you move back to the begining. "this is where i am from, the world was dust, we knew it to be Sudan, there was no more". but, to explain the begining, and to get to the end, you often have laughs in the middle. "successful with women". eventually a life is woven infront of you, and somewhere along the way you become a part of the story.

it's just that i haven't had a conversation like this before, one that starts with a burglary in Atlanta, draws you back to a small village in soutern Sudan, and marches you in and out of Ethiopia, the jungles, the rivers, the lions stare, over the bodies, into the refugee camps, into love, out of heartbreak. this is a vast story. this is a story told unflinchingly by the best of humanity, told of the worse afflicition humanity can bring down. of one person who knows his story intermingles with millions of others.
this is about the Lost Boys, about the civil war of Sudan, of apparent caste systems and the invisible ones, about loss and grief, the physical and emotional distress that a body can handle, love, war, violence, learning to write in dirt, growing up, struggle, transformation, adaptation.

mostly this is a clear voice that has every right to be broken or twisted, but it is not, it remains even lyrical, humorous.

what i am left with is the word war, how small it is. like boy. these words should have thousands of letters in them to convey their impact, because i had no idea. you can hear these words and they might conjur one image. maybe two or three. but what Dave Eggers and Achack have done is paint a huge landscape behind three letters. murals upon murals in my head, and what is hung on them is so touching, so sickening and moving, such a story is told that you can't go back to where you were before. boy. war.

give me better words. give us a better world to match this boy.

this might be one of the most important books of our time. it is absolutley required reading. (less)

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Apr 28, 2008 Kate rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was the most amazing book I've ever read. There were times I just wanted to put it down, some of the events were just too much to handle and I wondered whether it was worth being brought down to such dark depths. But even through the unbelievably sad and shocking things that happened to Achak, the narration is so incredible and personal. I couldn't stop reading, and I couldn't stop thinking about him. In the past few weeks that I've been reading this, Achak is always on my mind, he's with m...more This was the most amazing book I've ever read. There were times I just wanted to put it down, some of the events were just too much to handle and I wondered whether it was worth being brought down to such dark depths. But even through the unbelievably sad and shocking things that happened to Achak, the narration is so incredible and personal. I couldn't stop reading, and I couldn't stop thinking about him. In the past few weeks that I've been reading this, Achak is always on my mind, he's with me wherever I go, telling me his story. It's incredible that someone could go through so much and continue to maintain the will to live. Despite the risk of depression, I think this book is incredibly important to read. It's one of those stories that forces you to recognize what an unfathomably huge place this world is, and that things happen every day that would be almost impossible for most of us to even imagine. A big part of the story deals with the fact that something this horrific can be happening to so many people, and most of the world is almost completely unaware. Reading a book like this puts my own life into perspective, and although it's not feasible to constantly maintain a downward comparison (because let's face it, no matter who you are, there's always someone who's worse off), it forces you to recognize that your own problems are so insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Dave Eggers did an incredible job telling Achak's story - his narration is so simple and easy to read, but very eloquent and powerful at the same time. I've read reviews that say differently, but I swear I really believed that this was the voice of Achak telling his story. So although it was exhausting to go through one horrible incident after another, it was still difficult to put it down.

The last page is one of the most beautiful things I've read and it moved me to tears, the whole concept that we're all on this earth together and we should all recognize each other's existence and love each other, because in the end through all of our differences, we have this incredible thing in common, which is life. (less)

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Aug 23, 2008 Rosa rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It took me a million years to finish reading this book. Even up to the very end, 30 pages from the end, then 20, then 10, then 5, I kept thinking, "Isn't this over yet?" I keep wondering if not being crazy about this novel makes me a bastard, because not only does the book aim to educate people about the staggering crisis in southern Sudan, but Dave Eggers donated 100% of the proceeds to help build schools, public libraries, etc., in the protagonist's war-torn village. It just struck me as being...more It took me a million years to finish reading this book. Even up to the very end, 30 pages from the end, then 20, then 10, then 5, I kept thinking, "Isn't this over yet?" I keep wondering if not being crazy about this novel makes me a bastard, because not only does the book aim to educate people about the staggering crisis in southern Sudan, but Dave Eggers donated 100% of the proceeds to help build schools, public libraries, etc., in the protagonist's war-torn village. It just struck me as being very monotonous... which, again, seems like a horrendous thing to say. The guy was forced to live in a refugee camp for ten years, so monotony was what defined his life for a very long time. I can't figure out if it was the actual events that I found boring (which would make me a soulless ghoul for sure), or if it was the narration. Looking at other reviews, it does seem that some other readers struggled to finish this book as well. I find discussing the book more interesting than the actual reading of it, namely, debating about Eggers's decision to write the book as a work of fiction despite the fact that the protagonist is a living person. Eggers said in numerous interviews that he initially started writing this as a work of nonfiction, but his own voice kept getting in the way, and it was only after deciding to write it as fiction that he felt sufficiently freed up to let Valentino Achek Deng's voice shine through (whuh?). But some reviewer who clearly has an axe to grind with Dave Eggers (how can anybody be pissed at Dave Eggers, by the way? It'd be like hating Wally Cleaver) cited a paragraph from this book and compared it alongside a paragraph from A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and there were undeniable similarities - I say "some reviewer" because I no longer have any recollection, but I seem to remember it being a "real" reviewer writing for a "real" publication... I would Google it, but I need to shower for the first time in days (I couldn't before now because I had to finish this book - I swear, it was frickin' arduous)... anyway, debates about the author's decisions aside, I have to pitch in my lot with all the people who were less than over the moon about this book. Although I will say that those people seem inordinately, illogically pissed at Dave Eggers himself, and my theory is that they're overcompensating in an attempt to alleviate their guilt because in the end, if you don't like this book, you're a bastard. By extension, if you don't read this book, you're a bastard. So there! Welcome to the club!(less)

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Jul 25, 2007 Grayem82 rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: anyone

This book is one of a series that make up the Voice of Witness series - a collection of books intended to give a voice to people whose lives have been plagued by conflict, persecution, exile and other such humanitarian crises. Such noble intentions aside, most people will encounter this book because of the author, Dave Eggers, author of the love-it-or-hate-it novel A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.

The book tells the semi-fictionalised biography of Valentino Achak Deng, a young man who h...more This book is one of a series that make up the Voice of Witness series - a collection of books intended to give a voice to people whose lives have been plagued by conflict, persecution, exile and other such humanitarian crises. Such noble intentions aside, most people will encounter this book because of the author, Dave Eggers, author of the love-it-or-hate-it novel A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.

The book tells the semi-fictionalised biography of Valentino Achak Deng, a young man who has as many names as he has had "homes": Achak; Valentino; Dominic; Sleeper; Gone Far; Red Army; Sudan; and Lost Boy.

Achak grew up in Southern Sudan amid the dormant political and cultural tensions between the "Arabs" of the North and the "Africans" of the South. His home-village is remote geographically and culturally. He has a pleasant life as a boy amid the safety and relative comfort of his extended family, but this life is shattered with the arrival of the civil war between the Islamic government of the North and the rebel army of the South, the SPLA. We witness the Islamic government's policy of "draining the river to catch the fish" by violently wiping out whole villages across Southern Sudan with the use of bombing raids and mounted Arab militias. Achak watches as the men are slaughtered, and the women and children are carried away to be sold as slaves.

Achak escapes, and begins his endless journey, first walking from Southern Sudan to Ethiopia; then from Ethiopia to Kenya; before travelling to the US.

Achak's journey is almost unbearably tragic and dangerous. He is one of innumerable war orphans and refugees, and thousands of young boys die on the journey. Achak's survival can only be attributed to the weight of odds, though, as time passes, Achak understandably begins to question whether God is punishing him for some unknown but monumental sin.

As is probably obvious, What is the What is not an easy read. There were moments when I wanted to throw it under my bed and forget about it because the repeated confrontation with the tragedy, cruelty and stupidity of human life was too much to bear. However, Achak is extremely likeable, and I began to really care about his welfare. It was also hard to give up on the hope that such an honest, benevolent, and determined person could not be rewarded at the end of the day. Mostly, though, the story is so well told, at the same time both a simple account of events and a complex emotional and metaphorical study of humanity.

Egger's debut work and this story share similarities: both are about "orphans". Both are semi-autobiographical. Both protagonists are searching for an escape from the tragedy of their pasts, in one way or another.

The differences are also numerous. Eggers' debut infuriated readers by combining confrontational emotional confession with tricksy literary games. While clever, these often seemed like pressure valves; like Eggers could only expose so much before ducking behind his post-modern stunts. Also, Eggers' voice was aggressively young and energetic - never sitting still; always performing literary cartwheels and painting elaborate metaphors.(less)

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Jan 04, 2009 Erin rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Billed as fiction, WHAT IS THE WHAT is actually the mostly-true story of Valentino Achak Deng, a Sudanese refugee who had to flee his country as a young boy- walking hundreds of miles through desert, corpses, and human atrocities of a war torn country. Of course, Dave Eggers did a brilliant job in mimicking the voice of the real Achak, as they collaborated on this novel over the course of three years. The real strength of this book is how it is told without judgement and anger. Facts are given,...more Billed as fiction, WHAT IS THE WHAT is actually the mostly-true story of Valentino Achak Deng, a Sudanese refugee who had to flee his country as a young boy- walking hundreds of miles through desert, corpses, and human atrocities of a war torn country. Of course, Dave Eggers did a brilliant job in mimicking the voice of the real Achak, as they collaborated on this novel over the course of three years. The real strength of this book is how it is told without judgement and anger. Facts are given, and emotion is present, but it makes it easier as a reader to form one's own opinions and feelings.

The story is told in three seperate sections. In Book I, Achak is living in Atlanta and has just been brutually attacked by two thieves who have raided his apartment and stolen all that he has acquired during his time in the US. The first portion of his flashback to the Sudan is told while Achak waits, bound by cords, on the floor for his roommate to return home and help him.

Book II takes place while he is at the hospital awaiting care for his wounds from the attack. Of course, it is a hospital here in the good ol' US, so he gets one MRI over the course of a 14 hour wait before he walks out of the hospital (without treatment) at 3:45 am so he can be to work by 5:30. The flashback that occurs during this wait is an account of starvation, disease, and struggle in a refugee camp in Ethiopia. Unfortunately, political issues enter into the mix, and he (along with thousands of refugees) are pushed out of the country violently.

The final portion of the book takes place while Achak is finally at work at a fitness club. He relates back to his experiences in the final camp that he lived in for about ten years, and his eventual flight to the United States, which happened to fall on September 11th, 2001. Needless to say, he did not get to America that day.

There is one horrific tragedy after another in this book, but it becomes more terrifying when it is recognized that these horrors occured while I was happily going about my life- pursuing an education, working without the fear of being harmed, and enjoying movies, travel, and relative peace. I spent time at the valentinoachakdeng.org website last night exploring the plight of this extraordinary man. All the proceeds of this book are going towards building a secondary school in Marail Bai, Achak's hometown in the Sudan as well as assisting the "Lost Boys" who have relocated in the US.

Again, I find myself wondering what I can do. Is it enough to throw money at a problem? Perhaps in lieu of doing more, that is the best that I can do...but, I wonder, is it enough?

(less)

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Jan 02, 2011 Kay rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

My Spanish teacher, Senor Serrano has been telling us about this book. He is currently reading it. He tells us bits and pieces that have me dying to read the book! I'm seconds away from begging my Mom to take to me to the bookstore!

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Jul 21, 2008 Lisa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

You know who should read What is the What? Um…everyone. It’s one of those rare books that are really easy to read, really gripping—it will grip you!—but also globally consequential.

What is the What, by Dave Eggers, is a docu-drama-type "novel" based on the real life of Valentino Achak Deng. At the age of seven (maybe eight) he watches his Sudanese village be attacked and destroyed by government-sponsored militia. Not knowing if his family is alive or dead, he's forced to run and ends up trekking...more You know who should read What is the What? Um…everyone. It’s one of those rare books that are really easy to read, really gripping—it will grip you!—but also globally consequential.

What is the What, by Dave Eggers, is a docu-drama-type "novel" based on the real life of Valentino Achak Deng. At the age of seven (maybe eight) he watches his Sudanese village be attacked and destroyed by government-sponsored militia. Not knowing if his family is alive or dead, he's forced to run and ends up trekking (on foot with thousands of other boys) across the deserts of three countries. They walk for months, pursued by militiamen on horseback, government bombers and predatory animals, carrying with them almost nothing in terms of clothing, shoes, shelter, food or water. After this epic journey in which he faces down every imaginable hardship, Achak spends many years in desolate Ethiopian and Kenyan refugee camps before finally being resettled in the U.S. where he finds "a life full of promise, but also heartache and myriad new challenges." (So lazy, I quote the back of the book)

I don’t know if Valentino is the unluckiest person ever, or the luckiest for having survived a lifetime of horrors you and I could only conjure in our worst nightmares. But whatever he is, his story is extraordinary. This book is suspenseful, intense, horrifying, heartbreaking, at times surprisingly sweet and funny, but always incredibly moving — if you don’t at least have the urge to make large donations to Mercy Corps after reading this, you’re an absolute robot. I don’t know if there’s a word strong enough to sum up this guy’s life — the tragedy, trauma, loss, deprivation — but it was crazy to read his story and know it had all really happened while I sat around watching Seinfeld and picking the onions off my cheeseburger.

Things that are really great about this book:

1. Eggers lays out the decades-old conflict in Sudan in a way that people like me who knew little about it can wrap their brains around. He weaves the history into his story really naturally and without ever making it a political invective.

2. The author drops the self-consciously clever post-modernist act and assumes the voice of Achak telling his story in first person. And outside of a few overly sophisticated turns of phrase, it works — sounds authentic and believable, as if it really were Achak telling his own story. Eggers does a terrific job of creating a "character" that is super lovable and pitiable but also respectable.

3. Despite the fairly devastating subject matter, What is the What is not depressing or the type of horrifying that makes you have to put it down. As a work of literature, it’s incredibly impressive and I found myself reading on because I was wowed. And too, Eggers makes this young Sudanese so very human and real that I felt a strong sense of commonality, which made me not want to turn away from him. And the book ends on a rather hopeful note.

So I recommend this book to you and everyone you know. It really is amazing, definitely top 10 material. If you want to learn more about it or read a (way) more articulate review, visit McSweeney’s Web site — they seem to have republished everything ever written about What is the What.(less)

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Jan 04, 2009 Shelly rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the story of Valentino Achak Deng, one of Sudan's "Lost Boys". I haven't finished it yet, but that's my own fault--the book is great.

OK. It's done. I've finished. It took me awhile to finish this book--and here's why: I started this book in the Spring of '08 after having read three other books w/ similar themes in the Fall of '07. It sounds horrible, I know, but the shock and awe and sadness of this story was no longer new to me, so it didn't pull me in like it should have. There were s...more This is the story of Valentino Achak Deng, one of Sudan's "Lost Boys". I haven't finished it yet, but that's my own fault--the book is great.

OK. It's done. I've finished. It took me awhile to finish this book--and here's why: I started this book in the Spring of '08 after having read three other books w/ similar themes in the Fall of '07. It sounds horrible, I know, but the shock and awe and sadness of this story was no longer new to me, so it didn't pull me in like it should have. There were significant differences between Achak's story and those told in A Long Way Gone: Memoir of a Boy Soldier,Allah is Not Obliged, and Refugee Boy (the other books I read), however. Namely, Achak was never a child soldier. But the young boy on the run who is separated from his family, who has no idea where he is headed or who to trust or if any of his relatives are alive or where he is going to sleep or eat or how many more of his friends will starve to death or be eaten by lions or be forced to fight for a rebel militia is, sadly, all too familiar.

But What is the What distinguishes itself in a couple of significant ways. For starters, it's not exactly fiction and it's not exactly non-fiction--but a kind of hybrid of the two genres. Valentino Achak Deng's story is told second hand through Dave Eggers. The pair spent a great deal of time together--

"Over the course of many years" Valentino explains "Dave and I have collaborated to tell my story by way of tape recording, by electronic mailings, by telephone conversations and by many personal meetings and visitations...I told Dave what I knew and what I could remember, and from that material he created this work of art."

Much to Eggers credit, it's hard to imagine as you read this "novel" that the voice you are hearing is anyone other than Achak's. At no point did I doubt the validity or authenticity of the story. And, thankfully, at no point did I feel I was being tricked by a slick author into feeling emotional, or overly sentimental over something that I normally would have no reaction to. I hate being cued that way. We all have different triggers, and I like being able to judge what warrants an emotional response on my own. Eggers does a good job here of presenting you with a story and letting you make of it what you will.

The other, or one of the other I should say, main ways in which Achak's story distinguishes itself is that is doesn't end happily w/ relocation in the U.S. or Great Britain, etc. In fact, at the start of the story Achak is living in Atlanta, GA post the Sudanese Civil War and is robbed and beaten in his apartment he shares w/ another Lost Boy. Both of whom work two jobs, earn close to minimum wage, and are full time students. We hear his life story as he looks back, silently:

"When I first came to this country, I would tell silent stories. I would tell them to people who had wronged me. If someone cut in front of me in line, ignored me, bumped me or pushed me, I would glare at them, staring, silently hissing a story to them. You do not understand, I would tell them. You would not add to my suffering if you knew what I had seen."

And so we are always there when someone wrongs Achak, to hear his "silent" stories.

As hard as it is for someone like me--raised on cable tv, fast food, and 80s music--to imagine what life was like for a Lost Boy, it's even harder for me to imagine what life was like for Valentino Achak Deng. The sadness and just plain shittiness he is forced to deal with does not end with the end of the Civil War. Still, if I weren't exposed to realities like his, I'd probably be an even bigger asshole than I am now. Yes, my job sucks. But for fuck's sake--things could be worse. They could always be worse. (less)

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Jun 16, 2008 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

These days - when it comes to finding and selecting reading material, it seems I'm all on my own. (Well, not entirely alone, thanks to websites like Goodreads.) I have set a goal to buy two new books a month, or one new book every two weeks. This past year I have decided to start my own little library, and prefer to own all of the books that I read. I carry my books around with me (sometimes in my messenger bag), and read only when I know that I can REALLY READ. I don't want to race over the pag...more These days - when it comes to finding and selecting reading material, it seems I'm all on my own. (Well, not entirely alone, thanks to websites like Goodreads.) I have set a goal to buy two new books a month, or one new book every two weeks. This past year I have decided to start my own little library, and prefer to own all of the books that I read. I carry my books around with me (sometimes in my messenger bag), and read only when I know that I can REALLY READ. I don't want to race over the pages, and run through the words - I want to sit in the scenery, open my eyes, and SEE what I am reading. The way I see it - it's not a race, these books have been on shelves for longer then I know, and have been patiently been waiting to be Experienced and Remembered. But, you're not going to remember or get the full experience if you're just trying to Finish it. When I was reading Kafka On the Shore, I wanted to know the end, to see where this road led Kafka, But I didn't want the story to be Finished - I hesitated and postponed reading the final pages because I wanted to stay there with Kafka for a little longer.

Today is March 28th, 2008 and I have purchased my own copy of What is the What from Booklink in Northampton, MA. (The events that led to my purchasing this book from this store may have some significance later on.)

I once met a so-called Lost Boy this past year at the end of a Yo La Tengo show. At that time, I didn't know anything about these Lost Boys or the conflict in Sudan. The girl who introduced me to this Sudanese refugee said that this young man was temporarily living with her family. She also instructed me to do some research on the Lost Boys of Sudan as soon as I could. Later that night, I jumped on Wikipedia, and read the short entry about the Lost Boys. In shock and in awe - a few thoughts came to my mind: Why is this the first time I head about this? What is the current condition in Sudan, and why did these young men/people feel the need to flee their county? What did these people have to do to escape, and what did they endure to make it out safely? What do they have to endure now as Refugees? What is it like to dwell in another land so different from the one they came from? What is their future, and what is the future of their country? Will they ever go home?

Mostly, I thought to myself - I MET A LOST BOY.(less)

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Feb 07, 2008 Irishcoda rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: everyone!!!!!

Wow.

In the preface to What Is The What, Valentino Achak Deng says that he told his story to the author, Dave Eggers, over a period of years. Eggers captured Achak's tone and spirit so closely that I kept forgetting that the author was not the man who experienced the horrors of what happened in the Sudan. Some of the passages are fictional out of some necessity and that's why I guess the book can't be classified as a true memoir. Still, it is one of the most chilling and inspiring books I've ever...more Wow.

In the preface to What Is The What, Valentino Achak Deng says that he told his story to the author, Dave Eggers, over a period of years. Eggers captured Achak's tone and spirit so closely that I kept forgetting that the author was not the man who experienced the horrors of what happened in the Sudan. Some of the passages are fictional out of some necessity and that's why I guess the book can't be classified as a true memoir. Still, it is one of the most chilling and inspiring books I've ever read.

I am one of those people almost completely ignorant of what was going on in the world in the late 1980s and all of the 1990s. My kids were being born and I was busy raising them, working and coping with other unfortunate complications like my first husband's failing health. When I saw Hotel Rwanda I thought, how could I not know about this? This is like what Hitler did.

I feel the same way after reading this book. Achak was a small boy in a poor village in southern Sudan when war and terror arrived in the form of mhraleen, invaders from Khartoum. There was always unease between the Arabs of northern Sudan and the Africans of the south although in Achak's village, they traded freely and were friendly with each other. Achak's village was burned to the ground and he had to run for his life, not knowing if any member of his family survived.

He became one of the "Lost Boys" who walked in a group what became hundreds of refugee children across the Sudan and into Ethiopia first, then Kenya. Along the way, boys died from starvation, exposure and disease. The boy Achak saw other little ones carried off by lions. They were chased and strafed by the Sudanese army. Sanctuary consisted of poor, mean little settlements and it took a long time for Achak to learn what happened to his family and make his way to the United States.

Ironically (although after everything that happens to him I shouldn't have been surprised) the plane taking him to New York was scheduled to depart September 11, 2001. We all know what happened then.

He did make it to Atlanta at last...and after going through all the suffering and misery of his young years, he opens the door one day and his home is invaded. He is beaten and robbed.

That's not even half of it.

If I ever feel too sorry for myself and complain about my woes, I'm going to go back and read this post and remember what this man experienced.

I think everyone should read his story.

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Jan 09, 2008 Tung rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs

Disclaimer upfront: I thought A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was overrated, and And They Shall Know Our Velocity was atrocious. So overall, not a huge fan of Eggers and don’t think him this leader of contemporary fiction so many others do. What is the What, however, is the best of the 3 Eggers books I’ve read, and it is a fine work. This book is a detailed glimpse at the life of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan – a fictionalized account of the actual life of Valentino Achak Deng, a Sudan...more Disclaimer upfront: I thought A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was overrated, and And They Shall Know Our Velocity was atrocious. So overall, not a huge fan of Eggers and don’t think him this leader of contemporary fiction so many others do. What is the What, however, is the best of the 3 Eggers books I’ve read, and it is a fine work. This book is a detailed glimpse at the life of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan – a fictionalized account of the actual life of Valentino Achak Deng, a Sudanese refugee now living in America. Eggers apparently spent a lot of time speaking to Achak and getting his life story: how he lived, why he fled, how horrific his flight to Ethiopian refugee camps was, what life was like in that camp, his transition to living in America, etc. Eggers also uses an interesting narrative trick: Achak narrates his story to different people around him in the book. At the beginning of the story, Achak is robbed in his Atlanta home and then bound and gagged. A young boy named Michael is assigned to watch over him. The first third of Achak’s story is narrated to Michael. Achak is then taken to a hospital to treat his wounds, and he narrates some of his story to the registration nurse at the hospital while he waits. This is a great device, as it feels like Achak is aware that people around him are staring at him and judging him, and he has so much of his experience to share with others around him that explain who he is and what he has been through that he mentally details his life to them. The prose in this book is first-rate because of this structure and unique voice. My only problem with this book was that it was nearly 500 pages long and it feels it. Unlike Special Topics in Calamity Physics that didn’t feel its length, this book does. Eggers (through Achak) early on states that the Sudanese like to speak (and speak and speak). You can imagine these interview sessions between Eggers and the real-life Achak, and picture Achak talking for hours. So Eggers captures all of the very many details and experiences related by Achak to us. I understand that, but this book still felt a bit too long. Minor gripe; Eggers deserves the praise he’s getting for his book this time.(less)

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Jan 27, 2008 Stephen rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was exposed to this book through the "One Book, One Philadelphia" program, and I devoured it over the course of a few days immediately after I read Imaculee Ilibagiza's book Left to Tell (part of my "death and destruction in East Africa" kick, I suppose). It turned out to be a very interesting juxtaposition, as Ilibagiza consistently credits her faith, even miracles, for bringing her through the Rwandan holocaust alive, while Dave Eggers's Deng consistently doubts the beneficence of his God.

Th...more I was exposed to this book through the "One Book, One Philadelphia" program, and I devoured it over the course of a few days immediately after I read Imaculee Ilibagiza's book Left to Tell (part of my "death and destruction in East Africa" kick, I suppose). It turned out to be a very interesting juxtaposition, as Ilibagiza consistently credits her faith, even miracles, for bringing her through the Rwandan holocaust alive, while Dave Eggers's Deng consistently doubts the beneficence of his God.

The account of the Second Sudanese Civil War and the subsequent Diaspora are nothing short of amazing. I was constantly reminding myself that the events Eggers relates actually took place, and each time this sunk in, finding myself crushed by the magnitude of hardship. Valentino Achak Deng has endured enough suffering for hundreds at every turn of his life, yet continues to move forward, continues to relate his story to those who will listen. Overall, the book is a masterfully told depiction of one of the great tragedies of our time. Everyone should read this.

Yet I found myself unconsciously glancing at the title page every time I opened this book... What is the What: The Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng, A Novel, by Dave Eggers. "Interesting choice of designations," I initially thought. But then, as I realized the magnitude of this tale, and further, I was reminded of the magnitude of the Sudanese Diaspora, my thoughts resolved themselves a bit. Isn't it a bit disturbing that the job of telling the story of an African man who has had one of the hardest lives I could imagine falls to a wealthy, white, American novelist? What happened to this African's voice? Now, I realize, as I have had this discussion with several already, that all of the proceeds go to charity, that Deng wrote the foreword praising Eggers as the perfect partner, and that Eggers's literary stylings are all but absent from the book. I realize that these two men had the best intentions in mind when composing this story. Yet I also notice the thousands, tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of Sudanese whose voices were appropriated, subsumed even, under the device of "The Autobiography, A Novel, by a Storyteller". Wasn't there a Sudanese (perhaps Deng himself) who could've related this same tale? Perhaps it may not have been quite as engaging in its prose, or quite as well organized, or moved as well in its narrative pace, but at least it wouldn't have reeked of colonialism. This was an African war, involving solely Africans, in fact, on which the United States and the rest of the developed world were distinctly absent from. While I do not pretend Eggers or his publishers intentions mirror those of the recent administrations of the United States, one would think the African nature of this story would demand an African voice.

Or perhaps I need to step off my soapbox and thank Deng and Eggers for a wonderfully personal account of one of the most awful sets of events I have ever read about. Five stars for the book. It was great, you should read it. Minus one star for an air of suspicion that may get more malicious as I think about the implications of this book more.(less)

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Jan 02, 2008 Mr. D rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

My faith is restored in Dave Eggers! After months of plodding, I have yet to make it through A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Toph is cute. The writing is at times fantastic. But goddamn, the ego. The rambling. The chapter-long MTV casting interview.

But I desperately wanted to like Dave. His book of short stories, How We Are Hungry was at times beautiful. And though his second full-length book, You Shall Know Our Velocity! was as rambling as A Heartbreaking Work, I loved its humor a...more

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Sep 13, 2007 Ryan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: white people

du-du-dear reader!

haha, just a little inside joke there! don't worry if you don't understand it, because you probably won't, because it's between me and just one other person (that i know of) and that's why it's inside! and you're on the outside! so suck my dick! hahaha just kidding!

well, as you have already noticed, the title of today's show is "lions and tigers and armed mujadeen militia, OH MY!" and that's because the book we'll be discussing today is david eggers' fiction debut, "WHAT UP?!"...more

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Dec 03, 2007 Melody rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs-and-biographies

Valentino Achak Deng tells the story of his life through the words of Dave Eggers in What is the What. Since most of the happenings in the book occurred several years ago – the book is an historic novel based on actual occurrences. His story begins with the start of the over 20 year old civil war between the government of Sudan and the People’s Liberation Movement/Army. When his village is attached, Achak flees on foot and walks across Africa toward Ethiopia while dodging bombs, bullets and lio...more Valentino Achak Deng tells the story of his life through the words of Dave Eggers in What is the What. Since most of the happenings in the book occurred several years ago – the book is an historic novel based on actual occurrences. His story begins with the start of the over 20 year old civil war between the government of Sudan and the People’s Liberation Movement/Army. When his village is attached, Achak flees on foot and walks across Africa toward Ethiopia while dodging bombs, bullets and lions; while watching countless of his fellow refugees be eaten by crocodiles, blown up by land mines, or die from malaria; toward an unknown salvation. He does not know what became of his family, he does not know when he’ll eat his next meal, and he has no idea how many days he will live.

After Deng relates tragedy after tragedy he finally receives word that some of the boys will be relocated to safer countries. He imagines a place where he can receive a good education and earn enough money to start a family and return to Sudan to help rebuild after the war ends. But life is not easy for the Sudanese “lost boys”. Most were relocated without any money or possessions and were expected to exist in a very alien culture by working in the least desirable minimum-wage jobs. This resulted in the Sudanese relocation being called a “failed experiment.” From the book:

“We were the model Africans. For so long, this was our designation. We were applauded for our industriousness and good manners and, best or all, our devotion to our faith. The churches adored us, and the leaders they bankrolled and controlled coveted us. But now the enthusiasm has dampened. We have exhausted many of our hosts. We are young men and young men are prone to vice. Among the four thousand are those who have entertained prostitutes, who have lost weeks and months to drugs, many more who have lost their fire to drink, dozens who have become inexpert gamblers, fighters.

What is the What is Valentino’s attempt to get the story of the plight of his people out to the world in hopes that they money raised (all proceeds from the book will be used to improve the lives of Sudanese in Sudan and elsewhere) will benefit Sudan.
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Aug 13, 2007 Bobby rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: recent-fiction, book-club-picks, sudan, georgia

Eggers has brought together his fiction writing skills and the very real story of a Sudanese refugee. Through years of interviewing Achak, the author took these stories and intricately wove them into a seamless novel based on a severe reality. The story depicts Achak's childhood as one of the now infamous "Lost Boys." Making his way to the United States, Achak is consistently confronted with questions about his place in his new home and his past through which everything is filtered. Although the...more

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Jan 03, 2008 Amy Galaviz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It was 30% off at the Coop, highly rated on this site, and Katy is reading it too, so why not? :-)

Updated:
Very moving. Made me laugh, made me cry, gave me nightmares. Made me feel guilty for taking so many things for granted, getting annoyed over petty things, when there are so many in this world who have nothing and who have lost everyone they love. Any review I might attempt would not give this book justice, so I'd say that this should be required reading for everyone.

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Sep 16, 2007 Pablo added it · review of another edition

Eggers' voice here seems muddled and strained, in noticeable contrast with the freewheeling style of Heartbreaking Work. It seems that Eggers is trying to mimic the wooden speech of an African-born English speaker. He may have succeeded, but he has definitely succeeded in alienating at least one reader.

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Feb 21, 2013 Lilisa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: around-the-world-2013

Narrated by Dion Graham and written brilliantly by Dave Eggers, What is the What is the spellbinding story of Valentino Achak Deng moving between the present in Atlanta to the past - growing up as a young boy in Sudan's civil war and his escape to Ethiopia, Kenya and finally America. And it is ironic that having survived the horrors of civil war, hunger and horrific conditions, it's in the land of opportunity and freedom that Valentino's sense of dignity and spirit are put in jeopardy. An engros...more

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Sep 06, 2011 Borbality rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I think I'm not unusual in not knowing a lot about Africa in general, let alone Sudan or Kenya. For a lot of us, Africa in school was just that really hard geography test.

And let's face it, for most of us Westerners as adults, Africa mostly just makes us uncomfortable. Sort of something we'd just rather not think about, which isn't a good thing really at all, but I guess it helps us feel better about things.

So while I type this at work during some downtime, and my coworkers complain about not...more I think I'm not unusual in not knowing a lot about Africa in general, let alone Sudan or Kenya. For a lot of us, Africa in school was just that really hard geography test.

And let's face it, for most of us Westerners as adults, Africa mostly just makes us uncomfortable. Sort of something we'd just rather not think about, which isn't a good thing really at all, but I guess it helps us feel better about things.

So while I type this at work during some downtime, and my coworkers complain about not getting as much paid time off as they would in Europe (of course ignoring any other differences between continents), people in this book have never seen ICE before. And their friends get eaten by tigers. And a starving caravan of naked boys struggles to gather the last of their strength to climb trees in the hopes of finding a meal of tiny raw bird eggs filled with feathers and beaks and wings.

I can't help but compare this to "Angela's Ashes," which is sort of a similar hardship story of someone from Ireland. However, I sort of thought that one was a load of crap. That story was strangely entertaining and described true poverty, which "What" also is at times, but "Angela's Ashes" lacked any serious depth -- and that for a true autobiography just made it seem lazy or poorly written. Furthermore, it's no fault of that author (Frank McCourt), but I can't help thinking that a lot of its success is based on some sort of white guilt complex (come on, every white person claims to be part Irish) to feel like their people struggled just as bad as others. Very cynical, I know, and I'm not proud that I think this way (I'm white too, btw).

"What Is The What" is trickier because it's written and told in first person by Dave Eggers, who is painfully obviously not a Sudanese refugee. I think he handled the task well, and while no one likes the idea of a white guy making a bunch of money in this kind of situation, I think he did it as best he could. It's a story that deserves to be told and has helped publicize much about a region most of us know very little about. What a hell of a story this guy has, too.

At times it seemed like even the author grew weary from the sheer repeated hopelessness of events, just sort of retelling the constant bad news. "Then my friend died. Then I was finally boarding the plane to America but it happened to be 9/11. Why does god hate me? etc"

The whole thing is slightly unsettling because of the whole ghost writer thing. While I don't think it's truly a ghost writer situation, the story is still told as if Achack is the one writing it. I'm sure Eggers put in tons of work on this and did hundreds of interviews and worked together on the story, and became great friends with Achack and all that truly good stuff, but as a reader you still just can't help wondering what is Eggers and what is Achack. And you have to wonder what is embellished, suggested, steered toward a different direction, etc.

This is told as fiction but we're supposed to take it as an autobiography, so it's just kind of hard to swallow completely. And the narrative voice is in this sort of African "accent" that seems authentic but again is just kind of unsettling knowing a really really white guy wrote it.

But don't let this discourage you from reading it. There's a lot of good stuff here. There's also a lot of humor and just plain good description that really brings the people to life. It really is a story of people, and how your birthplace does a lot to determine what kind of life you will live. That's what this kind of story needs to be truly effective, just real people readers can relate to. Really gets the water works going.

There's one profound moment where a street musician (I think) sings a song asking why so many mothers had to bring children into such a difficult world. Achack comes off as a great guy with a great sense of morals and ambition, and you can't help but like him.(less)

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