The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost African Childhood

New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008. CD3 - A 3rd printing hardcover book SIGNED and inscribed by Helene Cooper to previous owner on the title page in very good condition in very good dust jacket. Book has tanning, dust jacket and book have some bumped corners and light shelf wear. IN THIS POIGNANT MEMOIR, NEW YORK TIMES JOURNALIST HELENE COOPER TELLS THE STORY OF HER PRIVILEGED LIBERIAN CHILDHOOD CUT BRUTALLY SHORT BY A BLOODY 1980 COUP, HER FAMILY'S ESCAPE AND SURVIVAL, AND, TWENTY-THREE YEARS LATER, HER RETURN TO HER NATIVE COUNTRY TO FIND THE FOSTER SISTER HER FAMILY LEFT BEHIND. 8.5"x5.75", 354 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. Helene Cooper is "Congo," a descendant of two Liberian dynasties - traced back to the first ship of freemen that set sail from New York in 1820 to found Monrovia. Helene grew up at Sugar Beach, a twenty-two-room mansion by the sea. Her childhood was filled with servants, flashy cars, a villa in Spain, and a farmhouse up-country. It was also an African childhood, filled with knock foot games and hot pepper soup, heartmen and neegee. When Helene was eight, the Coopers took in a foster child - a common custom among the Liberian elite. Eunice, a Bassa girl, suddenly became known as "Mrs. Cooper's daughter." For years the Cooper daughters - Helene, her sister Marlene, and Eunice - blissfully enjoyed the trappings of wealth and advantage. But Liberia was life an unwatched pot of water left boiling on the stove. And on April 12, 1980, a group of soldiers staged a coup d'etat, assassinating President William Tolbert and executing his cabinet. The Coopers and the entire Congo class were now hunted, being imprisoned, shot, tortured, and raped. After a brutal daylight attack by a ragtag crew of soldiers, Helene, Marlene, and their mother fled Sugar Beach, and then Liberia, for America. They left Eunice behind. A world away, Helene tried to assimilate as an American teenager. At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill she found her passion in journalism, eventually becoming a reporter for the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. She reported from every part of the globe - except Africa - as Liberia descended into war-torn, third-world hell. In 2003, a near-death experience in Iraq convinced Helene that Liberia - and Eunice - could wait no longer. At once a deeply personal memoir and an examination of a violent and stratified country, The House at Sugar Beach tells of tragedy, forgiveness, and transcendence with unflinching honesty and a survivor's gentle humor. And at its heart, it is a story of Helene Cooper's long voyage home.. Signed by Author. 3rd Printing. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.