Drinking Coffee Elsewhere Analysis

I read the first piece called "Brownies," which is about a Brownie troop of fourth-grade African American girls from suburban Atlanta, Georgia, who go to summer camp. And they decide to creep up on a troop of white Brownies who are "ponytailed and full of energy, bubbling over with love and money" and "teach them a lesson" for a racial insult they inflicted.

Growing up in Japan, where people don’t have as much conflicts about racial and religion as here, I didn’t expect to be able to imagine how the people involved with those issues really felt. But Packer’s descriptive writing style enabled me to vividly picture the scenes and even made me identify myself with the characters in the story (although it still took me a while to fully understand). Packer has a strong voice and the ability to convey surreal situations plausibly. Being loyal to a deep, beautiful, and painful honesty, she also describes how human beings behave and lets me experience that knowledge.

In her story, Packer touches with sensitive issues, such as race and religion that play an important part in her story. Yet these concepts seem to line periphery and never intrude on her central concern that illuminates lives that are instantly familiar to us.