So how does a story, set initially in Labadee, Haiti, that stems at its root from sexual slave trafficking end up feeling like such films as “Scarface”, “Babel”? It also feels like a latter day story of our present day political climate producing the slow kill of civil rights in USA post 9/11? We can identify with the climate produced in the book that speaks of the hyper paranoid mentality of the boogie man from the east? I do believe what we have here is simply genius. Sahara has such biting, satirical quality that it can be called, to my view, ‘a latter day Gulliver’s Travels.’ Ricot has written a classic part satire, Greek tragedy, court drama, spiced with political intrigue, and as paradoxical as this may sound, a satirical-thriller that is spiked by her eye for sharp witticism and acute social observation.
How she makes it all seem so natural? How she spins this into one tale, a tale that seems so seamless, a tale that cross pollenates genres, a tale that is coherent and not feeling a little sliced up like say “21 Grams” did or “The Tree of Life” did is simply her triumph. The story feels near to the authors heart herein lies the key to make what should be an almost insurmountable and difficult task of telling this epic tale translate into something seemingly simple and effortless. This novel will be read fifty years from now.
Ricot places at the core of the structure of this book the theme of human trafficking, everything in this book: Italian mafia, drugs trafficking, terrorists, political theatre at the highest international level, to drug kings, all stems from the fact that the main character ‘Sahara’ a woman from the Caribbean island of Haiti was the victim of sex trafficking. Ricot knows too well that the exploitation of females on this planet is not going away today or tomorrow. From the grotesque cases of femicide (a new term for me even) in Mexico, to the mass rape of Bosnian Muslims in the 1990’s during The War in Former Yugoslavia as a method of ethnic cleansing, to facial disfigurement via acid attacks in places like Pakistan, gang rape in India, to deplorable cases of female child brides in countries like Yemen, to the kidnapping of schoolgirls in Nigeria by Boko Harem, suffice to say that crimes of exploitation against women is not going away any time soon. Ricot has chosen a theme that is deadly serious, a theme that is harrowing as well as tragic. There is no small wonder she is able to get her teeth into the spirit of this book.
The nations that this book crosses between are the impoverished, poorest, least economically developed of all Latin American countries, the pro-American island nation of Haiti, with the pathetic figure of Bertrand Aristide who fellates the will of his Western Masters who come to his rescue under the figure of Bill Clinton. The non-aligned island neighbor nation of Haiti’s Cuba that has just revoked her pro-Western puppet Batiste when this tale spins, thus producing a fresh ambience of revolution simmering in the air as Che Guevarra declares before the UN that Cuba is “a non-aligned nation.” Lastly we have our Western overlords, the puritanical United States, a powerful nation.
The protagonist of this novel Sahara is a Femme Fatale. The gauntlet to survive harsh conditions with enormous adversity is handed down to her. She has no choice but to succeed. This could be a vastly grim tale. On the contrary Ricot has produced a truly thrilling read worthy of the company of fellow female writers like Danielle Steel or Anne Rice. This book is a political satire. But this review will fail in its objective to influence readers to read what is my felt sense that this book is a classic, if I fail to emphasize and re-emphasize that this novel “Sahara” reads completely like a work of fiction, for it tells a fantastic epic story that holds your interest from start to end.
Thank you Michael for this wonderfully well-crafted and elaborate review. Please feel free to visit again. Your feedback and comments are always welcome.
Michael Mulvihill
January 27, 2015 at 6:45 pmSahara is a brilliant read. I could not put it down. It was gripping, suspense filled, dramatic and moving
http://dublinhorrorwriter.blogspot.ie/2015/01/sahara-by-angella-ricot-review-michael.html
So how does a story, set initially in Labadee, Haiti, that stems at its root from sexual slave trafficking end up feeling like such films as “Scarface”, “Babel”? It also feels like a latter day story of our present day political climate producing the slow kill of civil rights in USA post 9/11? We can identify with the climate produced in the book that speaks of the hyper paranoid mentality of the boogie man from the east? I do believe what we have here is simply genius. Sahara has such biting, satirical quality that it can be called, to my view, ‘a latter day Gulliver’s Travels.’ Ricot has written a classic part satire, Greek tragedy, court drama, spiced with political intrigue, and as paradoxical as this may sound, a satirical-thriller that is spiked by her eye for sharp witticism and acute social observation.
How she makes it all seem so natural? How she spins this into one tale, a tale that seems so seamless, a tale that cross pollenates genres, a tale that is coherent and not feeling a little sliced up like say “21 Grams” did or “The Tree of Life” did is simply her triumph. The story feels near to the authors heart herein lies the key to make what should be an almost insurmountable and difficult task of telling this epic tale translate into something seemingly simple and effortless. This novel will be read fifty years from now.
Ricot places at the core of the structure of this book the theme of human trafficking, everything in this book: Italian mafia, drugs trafficking, terrorists, political theatre at the highest international level, to drug kings, all stems from the fact that the main character ‘Sahara’ a woman from the Caribbean island of Haiti was the victim of sex trafficking. Ricot knows too well that the exploitation of females on this planet is not going away today or tomorrow. From the grotesque cases of femicide (a new term for me even) in Mexico, to the mass rape of Bosnian Muslims in the 1990’s during The War in Former Yugoslavia as a method of ethnic cleansing, to facial disfigurement via acid attacks in places like Pakistan, gang rape in India, to deplorable cases of female child brides in countries like Yemen, to the kidnapping of schoolgirls in Nigeria by Boko Harem, suffice to say that crimes of exploitation against women is not going away any time soon. Ricot has chosen a theme that is deadly serious, a theme that is harrowing as well as tragic. There is no small wonder she is able to get her teeth into the spirit of this book.
The nations that this book crosses between are the impoverished, poorest, least economically developed of all Latin American countries, the pro-American island nation of Haiti, with the pathetic figure of Bertrand Aristide who fellates the will of his Western Masters who come to his rescue under the figure of Bill Clinton. The non-aligned island neighbor nation of Haiti’s Cuba that has just revoked her pro-Western puppet Batiste when this tale spins, thus producing a fresh ambience of revolution simmering in the air as Che Guevarra declares before the UN that Cuba is “a non-aligned nation.” Lastly we have our Western overlords, the puritanical United States, a powerful nation.
The protagonist of this novel Sahara is a Femme Fatale. The gauntlet to survive harsh conditions with enormous adversity is handed down to her. She has no choice but to succeed. This could be a vastly grim tale. On the contrary Ricot has produced a truly thrilling read worthy of the company of fellow female writers like Danielle Steel or Anne Rice. This book is a political satire. But this review will fail in its objective to influence readers to read what is my felt sense that this book is a classic, if I fail to emphasize and re-emphasize that this novel “Sahara” reads completely like a work of fiction, for it tells a fantastic epic story that holds your interest from start to end.
Angella Ricot
January 28, 2015 at 4:17 amThank you Michael for this wonderfully well-crafted and elaborate review. Please feel free to visit again. Your feedback and comments are always welcome.