known_excellence’s Reviews > Sula > Status Update

This chapter introduces Sula Peace’s & Nel Wright’s friendship. The girls have a codependency that is unspoken. They are 12 & obsessed with boys. Their mothers dislike them for separate reasons but that bonds the girls. It’s summer & during their time at the river started innocently but ended in the death of a friend, Chicken Little. Shadrack saw which scares Sula. The girls feel responsible but don’t say.

Helene & Nel finally make it to her grandmothers house but she’s passed on. Helene’s mother, Rochelle meets Nel and leaves. It was a very fleeting interaction but I see that there isn’t much consideration there. Rolling into the next chapter, Nel’s friend, Sula and her family is introduced. Eva, the matriarch, becomes the home for the needy. The Deweys, Tar Baby, Hannah, Sula, and Plum all live there.

Introduced to Helene in 1920. She is from New Orleans but ended in Medallion after marrying a lake man. She has a daughter named Nel. Her grandmother is sick so she and Nel are traveling down to see her. Experienced racism on the train which goes to show how much life has changed for her in Medallion. She is a religious woman who loves her daughter. Seems self assured but also ‘manipulative’.

Introduced to Shadrack. Once a soldier who went through so much trauma in WW2, that he lost his memory. The founder of National Suicide Day (Jan 3rd), he creates it from his fear of the uncertainty of dying/death. To combat the fear, he created the day to allow others to find comfort in death. Eventually the town catches on to the holiday. It’s only celebrated by him, but everyone acknowledges the day.

Introduced to the neighborhood, The Bottom, where black people have lived for years but is slowing undergoing gentrification. Foundational businesses being removed for a golf course is the start of understanding of where this town is heading.