Expository Writing

                                                                              Spring Quarter 99

                                                                               Professor Gundy

                                 Book review for Never in a Hurry

Nye, Naomi S. Never in a Hurry. University of South Carolina Press, 1996.

Never in a Hurry by Naomi Nye tells her story about living in a foreign country and meeting relatives that she had never
met before.

She tells about her life as a young child in St. Louis and her family. Mrs. Nye wanted a regular, normal family where she
could have sleepovers with her friends instead of the unusual life she was living. As a child her family owned a small store
that sold trinkets such as camel saddles from her fathers native land of Jerusalem. She met many interesting stars when her
fathers business expanded into a large hotel.

Her family moved to Jerusalem for a while when she was a teenager. She was kicked out of school because she had
talked to one of her classmate’s, a boy, and that was not allowed. She could only talk to one of the other six girls at the
school. She met her grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins while living there. She found the culture to be so different than
that of the United States. She was offered gifts from everyone because she was a foreigner and their custom was to offer
her gifts. She had a great relationship with her grandmother and this book told many stories about her grandmother. This
book also gave an insider’s view of the fighting that was going on between neighboring countries while she was living there.
She told an interesting story of how in the middle of the night soldiers came banging on her uncle’s door wanting him since
he was the mayor.

After living there for a year the family left suddenly because of the fighting and moved back to the United States. They
moved to Texas and that is where Mrs. Nye finished growing up. She met her husband there and that is where they
currently reside. After several years she went back to Jerusalem to visit her ill grandmother and had the sleepover that she
had dreamed about as a child in her grandma’s hospital room. She told about the emotions of her grandmother’s illness
and they had shared a special bond.

There is one specific quote in this book that I really liked. Mrs. Nye talked about as a child her father told her that the sky
was constantly changing when he was a boy growing up in Jerusalem. While she was living there Naomi Nye and her
brother "kept our eyes cast upwards whenever we were outside at night, but the stars were different since our father was a
boy. Now the sky seemed too orderly, stuck in place. The stars had learned where they belonged. Only people on the
ground kept changing". I think it’s very true. We all change over time. There are some things that change constantly and
then there are other things that never change.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning about different cultures and sharing someone’s life
that they don’t know personally. The author did a great job sharing her life’s story to the readers of her book.