REFLECTION & REASON

She done did it again. This woman can write! Sister Souljah has created yet ANOTHER classic novel with the Porsche Santiaga Story, " A Deeper Love Inside " released in January of 2013. Re-reading " The Coldest Winter Ever " helped to bring the characters of the Santiaga family back to the forefront of my mind. Winter, the spoiled and beautiful princess, Lexus and Mercedes, the twins and babies of the family, the stunningly gorgeous queen of the family, Lana, and of course the charming and powerful Ricky Santiaga...legend, respected drug lord, and eventually the fallen soldier who's demise is the downfall of this envied clan of Brooklyn's finest. And then there was Porsche. Younger than Winter, older than the twins...she fell in between and was almost an oversight it seemed. Her most impactful moment in " The Coldest Winter Ever " was in the last scene, at the funeral of Lana Santiaga when through Winter's narration, we see Porsche a...

I read this book over 10 years ago, and it was an instant favourite . In fact, I've never met a person who read this book and didn't automatically crown it as the best book they had ever read. This story was phenomenal. It was groundbreaking. This book, these characters, and this author were the foundation of many great things to come. Now despite loving this book so much, I actually didn't remember much about it when I found myself ready to read Sister Souljah's latest novel, "A Deeper Love Inside." So with my autographed copy in hand, I realized that I couldn't read Porsche Santiaga's story until I had revisited the journey of her older sister, Winter. It was like I was reading the book for the first time, all over again. All I could remember that Winter was beautiful, and the story was gritty and an exhilarating page-turning journey...but the details had been forgotten. After entering the world of Midnight and his family and adventures in S...

I recently watched two movies I had never heard of prior to last week, via Netflix, as a result of a casual browse...and I was really fulfilled by the viewing experience. The movie "Mooz-lum" was released in February of 2011, and was written and directed by Qasim Basir. It's a story about a young Muslim man, Tariq (played by Evan Ross ), and his journey to college and battle with his identity. Raised by a strict Muslim father, Hassan (played by Roger Guenveur Smith ), and separated from his loving mother Safiyah ( Nia Long ) due to her problems with Hassan, Tariq grew up under religious scrutiny from his father and abuse at the private school he was forced to attend. He knew no other life, and various flashbacks from his childhood show that Tariq always battled his Muslim identity . He was teased in school, he often took off his Kufi cap whenever he was not in the presence of his father. It was an obvious battle, and made him extremely introverted and visibly distu...