Dear Haiti, Love Alaine

By: Maika Moulite, Maritza Moulite

Narrated by: Bahni Turpin

Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

When a school presentation goes very wrong, Alaine Beauparlant finds herself suspended, shipped off to Haiti, and writing the report of a lifetime....

You might ask the obvious question: What do I, a 17-year-old Haitian American from Miami with way too little life experience, have to say about anything?

Actually, a lot.

Thanks to "the incident" (don’t ask), I’m spending the next two months doing what my school is calling a "spring volunteer immersion project." It’s definitely no vacation. I’m toiling away under the ever-watchful eyes of Tati Estelle at her new nonprofit. And my lean-in queen of a mother is even here to make sure I do things right. Or she might just be lying low to dodge the media sharks after a much more public incident of her own...and to hide a rather devastating secret.

All things considered, there are some pretty nice perks...like flirting with Tati’s distractingly cute intern, getting actual face time with my mom, and experiencing Haiti for the first time. I’m even exploring my family’s history - which happens to be loaded with betrayals, superstitions, and possibly even a family curse.

You know, typical drama. But it’s nothing I can’t handle.

©2019 Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite (P)2019 Harlequin Enterprises, Limited

Awesome representation of Haiti and it’s rich juicy history

I loved this story and the breadth and depth in its telling. Alaine is quirky character and the twists and turns in her tale kept me engaged throughout the entire book.

My only negative would be the fact that the person reading it read in a French accent rather than a Haitian one and that bothered me because if I wanted to listen to a book in French I wouldn’t have picked up something called “Dear Haiti”. Please be considerate of your audience and find a Haitian narrator.

a beautiful YA epistolary novel

I’m so glad I read Dear Haiti, Love Alaine! I received a digital review copy from NetGalley and Inkyard Press (Harlequin) in exchange for an honest review. I loved this novel so much that, after reading the eARC, I pre-ordered both a finished copy and the audiobook, and listened to it, in full, in the two days after its release. (Bahni Turpin narrates the audiobook and is wonderful, as usual.)

Alaine Beauparlant is super-smart, ambitious, and curious, traits that seem to serve her well and land her in trouble in equal measure. Thanks to the Moulites’ stunning writing and character development, Alaine feels true-to-life from the first page, growing more even complex and thoughtful as the story progresses. This is an epistolary novel featuring diary entries, emails, postcards, news articles, and transcripts of conversations, and the variety in form and voice made the 430-ish pages fly by.

Alaine is the daughter of Haitian immigrants. She lives with her (single) father, Jules, in Miami, where he works as a psychiatrist and she attends a progressive Catholic school. Her mother, Celeste, is a high-profile TV journalist living and working in Washington, D.C., and she has never been a consistent or accessible figure in Alaine’s life. Celeste's twin, Alaine’s Tati Estelle, is an influential woman in Haiti who works as both the Minister of Tourism and the CEO of a charitable start-up. After her mom's career hits a road-bump, Alaine hits one of her own. In the aftermath, her dad sends her to Haiti to intern with Estelle at her company, PATRON PAL, which connects donors ("patrons") with bright Haitian children in need (“pals")—a sort of 21st century version of a "sponsor a child" charity, gamified and made accessible by a smartphone app. While in Haiti, Alaine seeks to learn more about her family and its role in Haitian history (for both her own edification and a school assignment), and, naturally, learns a great deal about herself and her immediate family in the process.

Dear Haiti, Love Alaine is a standout debut. A powerful depiction of family legacies and secrets, and a loving portrait of both Alaine (full of heart, dry wit, and good intentions) and the country and people of Haiti. This will be a great fit for readers who enjoy heartfelt, intricately-crafted young adult fiction and the work of Elizabeth Acevedo, Ashley Herring Blake, Deb Caletti, and Brandy Colbert.

Love Bahni but that’s it

I decided to listen to this audiobook because I love Bahni Turpin’s narration but this story didn’t do it for me.

Fun listen, great main character

I enjoyed Alaine's voice. She is smart, a thinker, and a bit impulsive. Her youth is not a mark against her character, and she is allowed to grow throughour the book. The switches between diary entries, present tense, and letters was a little tricky to follow sometimes, but overall it's a fun listen. Great to learn a bit about Haiti and see the immigrant experience as well as the return "home." Some important themes could have been explored more and it feels like it could have been a longer book, but the length is probably appropriate for YA. I'm pre-ordering One of the Good ones.

Read the book vs listening on audible

Kudos to the authors for a cute book with content us Haitian-American could identify with. The narration, however, was terrible- it should have been someone who knows the pronunciation of the basics like “Fritay”. The audio version could have done without the accent, because none of our aunts or uncles sound like that and was just unnecessary.

Wasn’t for me

I tried my best to get into this book and it was not for me. I got to the point where I couldn’t even finish it.

A nice light read

I bought this for my rising middle school God Daughter on recommendation as a fun summer read. She LOVES to read, but I of course wanted to read it first before gifting it. Glad I read it to the end. It was a clean read, but with some tooics illuded to, I think I'll hold onto it to gift when she's a bit older (like 7th or 8th) instead of staying 6th this fall.

It was a fun and interesting story and to my American ears with only one Hatian American friend, the narrtion accent didn't bother me. Outside of the accent maybe not being as "authentic" as some would hope for, I thought the narrator did a great job giving distinctive voices to the characters, which was needed as it's a little confusing with the jumps between the characters thoughts, emails, letters and text. I had to replay some parts 2x to get it.

4 stars for the jumping and the wrap up. The end was ok, but the main character's conclusions fell flat for me. I'm guessing that was indicative of her maturity; maybe if I were younger, I would have agreed but as an adult, you definitely know things aren't always so polarized.

If nothing else, I found myself looking into Haitian history and wanting to try her twist out recipe. I'm looking forward to being one of those cruise tourist she spoke of this fall.

nice story

the first have of the story doesn't match the rest of the story. I honestly could skip listening to the first half and jump to her journey to Haiti and that story would be enough

great story, but hard to follow on audio

I love Bahni Turpin and this book was a super fun story, but I found myself getting confused and lost with the jumping back and forth between emails, flashbacks, text messages, and regular diary entries. If I had read this in ebook or physical book, I might have followed along better. Overall, it was a decent contemporary YA.

Little torn

Alaine gets so annoying by the end, but I enjoyed the characters overall. The performance was beautiful.