The Element of Family Life in Eric Jeromes Works - Essay Example

Outline 0 Outline Works Cited 8 Erick Jerome Dickey Introduction This paper discusses the works of Erick Jerome Dickey, and offers insight into these works. Dickey’s Biography Jerome’s writing remains unmatched in the 21st century, drawing a close relationship between reality and fiction in so captivating a way. Eric Jerome Dickey was born in Memphis Tennessee on July 7th 1961. He grew up in Memphis where he attended is early life education Riverview Elementary and later Junior High. Jerome later attended Carver High before proceeding for his higher education at the State University of Memphis. While at the university, Jerome pursued a degree in Computer System Technology. This was before he later made another decision to move to the city of Los Angeles in the year 1983. As unpredictable as he has always been, this time Jerome had in mind a desire to pursue a career in engineering. True to his interest then, he was indeed very lucky to be employed as a software developer with developer. Nevertheless, Jerome was to later realize his real were in arts, something which he quickly got absorbed into and turned volumes and volumes of paper into narrations. Eyeing comedy in general, Jerome quit his job and devoted his time and energy in writing scripts for his comedy. Full of creativity, Jerome preferred stand up comedies which he enjoyed and made improvements on each time. Nevertheless this was not the only art that Jerome derived satisfaction from. Soon he began writing short stories and his first publication came in the year 1994 under the title “Thirteen”. As an eye opener, “Thirteen” was a stepping stone to other big things to come. For instance, he acted the “Cappuccino”, movie that gained fame and rose to limelight in Los Angeles in the year 1998. Jerome has earned himself a position as an international writer and a cross language artist. This came about after he published a book in French entitled Café Noissette, translated to mean Milk in My Coffee. His other works include Friends and Lovers, cheaters, Liar’s Game, The Other Woman, Naughty or Nice, Drive Me Crazy, Sleeping With Strangers, amongst others. First Book Jerome’s first book Sister, Sister was published in 1996. In this Novel, Jerome captures the urban life through experiences and interactions between Valerie, Inda, and Chiquita (Jerome 53). The storyline addresses critical family issues that face contemporary urban families and the challenges that come with them. Jerome sets the events around Southern California families that are well blended I terms of racial affiliations. Coming from a family of white mother and black father, Valerie and Inda are exposed to the bitter taste of broken relationships but find strength from Chiquita who has a positive attitude towards life (Jerome 89). It is apparent in the story that being black or white has nothing to do with the delicate family life. Jerome brings out the hope in the end when Chiquita tries to make things work with Brown after the girls had been duped by Raymond. The theme of the story is majorly on family life, friendship, love and trust, urban life, and racism. We are introduced to the two sisters close knit family where there is concern and care for everyone, no wonder Chiquita admires Brown and starts warming toward him in her heart. The struggles of urban life and the contemporary issues in the society are other themes that the novel endeavors to address through the interactions of the characters in the story (Jerome 119). Love and trust is best portrayed in the incident in which Chiquita and Raymond had an argument over a female who called. It later emerged that Raymond is a womanizer who dates up to three women at a go. In fact, he was on the brink of duping the three friends that is Chiquita and the two sisters. Although it may be argues that Jerome brings out major characters with a portrayal authoritarianism, it id clear that the character of each one of then remains largely admirable as each one of them just struggles to have a good life. Inda’s and Chiquita’s are portrayed through first person narration. This makes them appear bold and perhaps with patronizing tones (Jerome 87). Second Book In addition to the Sisters, Sisters, Jerome again explores the limits to which one’s life may be pushed to in a bid to live in the fast changing society. Tempted By Trouble has a plot that explores the scenarios of big livings that may be suddenly brought to an end by unexpected change of circumstances. Through his characters, Dmytryk and Cora, Jerome narrates a possible scenario of a U-turn in life. Dmytryk is portrayed as a high living personality whose loss of job and bickering wife prompted to engage in unlawful activity convinced that it will be for just a while (Jerome 54). However, he gets absorbed into the robbing business and what dawns on him is the realization that walking out would not be too easy. Having been convinced that it would an easy affair of just two minutes in and out with loads of cash, Dmytryk agrees to compromise his integrity and risk his life for the sake of his dear wife. Ironically, Dmytryk’s wife Cora deserts him after he has gotten into robbery just to keep her happy, further devastating him since his getting into a bad life was solely done to make her happy. Again Jerome explores different themes of love and affection between Dmytryk and Cora; fate and destiny as Dmytryk ponder on whether it would be possible to go back to his former life; and moral decay in the society. The twists and turns in the story leaves one sympathizing with the major character whose life seems to take a nosedive with every corrective measure he attempts to make (Jerome 79). The Cora, Dmytryk and Eddie Coyle are the major characters around which the story is created. The tone of the narration varies with different characters in the novel. It is not quite easy to place Cora’s tone in any category since when she changes; she becomes badly allured into money and does anything just to have that. She loses her soft spot as a loving wife and turns into a wolf. Whether Cora’s change is just circumstantial or the circumstances have just helped in bringing out her true identity, she, nevertheless, remains highly unpredictable and of questionable character given her habits (Jerome 67). Comparison of the two books In the two books, we find Jerome focusing majorly urban life. In the first book, Sisters, Sisters, he had portrayed the lives of Inda and Valerie as struggle in which he created his male characters to portray the moral decay in the society where the concept of family is slowly being threatened by habits that creep in through unguarded lifestyles. He however brings some hope in the future for the three ladies since they can afford the comfort of each other during their hard times with sisterly love, care and concern. He exposes them to opportunities especially where we find Chiquita admiring the close family knit in her friends’ family and thinks about Brown more seriously (Jerome 112). Contrastingly in Tempted By Trouble, the life of Dmytryk is headed for doom without a clear indication of any hope. In fact, Jerome draws Dmytryk as a gentleman whose own life has rendered to be victim of other peoples’ circumstances. Despite trying everything to be happy, Dmytryk’s life is headed for melancholy, easily comparable to Antonio in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice. Unlike the female characters in Sister, Sister, Jerome has created female characters in Tempted By Trouble as lacking sound morals and associated then closely with every situation that went wrong (Jerome 91). From his other writings, Jerome cannot be accused of gender bias since this is not a trend. Moreover, the two books have been used to expose the flaws of urban life. Love in urban is suggestively being painted as money dependent. The two books explore the theme of love as elusive, especially true love. Dmytryk’s endeavors to sustain love are futile (Jerome 69) while for Inda, a divorce from her white husband has changed her opinion about life (Jerome 74). Review of Dickey’s Works As a talented writer, Jerome explores other books like Pleasure, Liar’s Game and The Other Woman. In Pleasure, Jerome uses the main character Nia Simone Bijou to mock the pleasures that people chase after as worthless. In Liar’s Game, Jerome paints Dana Ann Smith in a positive way perhaps communicating a message that when life gets unbearable especially in relationships, a fresh start elsewhere may offer the best solution just as Diana moves to Los Angeles to recover start afresh. Finally in the novel The Other Woman, Jeremy focuses on modern day family issues like work. He presents a case study of a man and a woman working round the clock at different times. This makes is impossible for both of them to have substantial time together. Charles soon starts and affair with another woman. This prompts his wife to do the same with another man, making situation move from frying pot into fire. Conclusion It has emerged that most of Eric Jerome’s works touch on the element of family life and quite a good number of them are set in Los Angeles. Perhaps one can conclude that Eric Jerome’s early life may have been affected by issues around family life and relationships, or perhaps even being a victim of such frictions at some point in his life. It is apparent that Eric Jeremy is well endowed with creativity. He has used this talent to speak his mind about life through books and short stories. Morals being taught in the story are blended between humors and may not be so direct. However, a closer analysis will always lead one into an understanding. Works Cited Dickey, Erick J. Genevieve. New York:NAL Publishers, 2009. Print Dickey, Erick J. Liars Game.Boston:Dutton Publishers. 2009. Print Dickey, Erick J. PleasureNew York:Dutton Publishers. 2008. Print Dickey, Erick J. Sisters, Sister. New York:Duton Publishers. 2006. Print Dickey, Erick J. Sleeping With Strangers. New York:Penguin. 2007. Print Dickey, Erick J. Tempted by Trouble. New York: NAL Publishers. 2010. Print Dickey, Erick J. The Other woman. New York: NAL publishers. 2011. Print Read More