Review by Bibliophile_87 -- Cry Baby Cry or Not

[Bibliophile_87]

[Following is a volunteer review of "Cry Baby Cry or Not" by DeWandus Johnson.]

---

1 out of 4 stars

---

Share This Review

---

Cry Baby Cry… Or Not by Dewandus Johnson, is a fictional story following a young girl’s tumultuous movements from one desperately bad situation to another. It is set in Chicago, Illinois amid the less favorable areas of the city, showcasing some of the most deplorable acts humans can imagine; from paedophila and prostitution to gang warfare and mutilating murders.

Trina is a 12 year old girl brought up by a deaf and dumb mother who has emotionally abused her since birth. The mother, Jackie, had a tough upbringing and pours her hatred of the world onto her daughter. Trina is a victim of sexual child abuse through her mother’s boyfriend, Marco. Marco not only abuses her but videos their meetings and sells the tapes. Trina’s sense of the world is unsurprisingly completely warped and trouble pursues her every move. She meets and is captivated by Mistro, a 15 year old gang member she encounters whilst he’s on an assassination mission for his gang. Mistro is equally as enthralled by Trina as she is by him and he absorbs her into his life filled with guns, violence and drugs.

This is not a book for the faint-hearted. The gritty and overly descriptive scenes of paedophila at the beginning of the story leave a bad taste in your mouth as you try to progress through this seemingly random and nonsensical tale. There are explicit sex scenes and highly detailed murders using vulgar language. Every vile human error you can possibly think of is present in this book, coupled with language that is difficult to stomach, resulting in a slow read.

The biggest disappointment for me is the lack of development of the characters. Often their descriptions are overly physical without delving into their personalities, leaving you uncommitted to them or their stories. I also disliked the overwhelming number of characters introduced, it was as if the author was just trying to get another shocking storyline added to the already unnecessarily clunky sequence of events. It is clear that storytelling is not the goal here; the dialogue between characters is short and uneventful, the author does most of the explaining and therefore the story feels forced and contrived.

It is difficult to see who the author’s intended audience for the book is. Due the distressing material covered and the indelicate way sensitive subjects are handled, this book would be out of the question for teens to read. However, because of the slang language used and the young ages of many of the characters, it feels as though it is written with a younger audience in mind which unsettles me.

If the idea behind this book was to bring to light how awful life is in the poorer areas of Chicago and how shocking gang life can be, that is a praiseworthy cause and as such should be done carefully and with a well-written, carefully edited and sensitively cultured piece. However, this book is not the eye-opener I had hoped for after reading the blurb. There is little or no editing done on the book, there are errors to be found on most pages whether that be spelling, grammar or simply word spacing. I would not recommend this book to anyone as I feel there must be better executed works of fiction out there to introduce a reader to this dark world, therefore I have rated it 1 out of 4 stars.

******
Cry Baby Cry or Not
View: on Bookshelves