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One of Michelle’s close college friends, whom she meets at the Third World Center. Personality-wise, she and Suzanne are very different despite their close friendship: Suzanne often prioritizes fun over making a practical choice. Michelle initially judges her for this, but when she passes away from an aggressive cancer at twenty-six, Michelle realizes that Suzanne’s way of doing things may have been right, and Michelle tries to find more fulfilling work in her own life.
Suzanne Alele Quotes in Becoming
The Becoming quotes below are all either spoken by Suzanne Alele or refer to Suzanne Alele. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 9 Quotes
I regretted not coming earlier. I regretted the many times, over the course of our seesawing friendship, that I’d insisted she was making a wrong move, when possibly she’d been doing it right. I was suddenly glad for all the times she’d ignored my advice. I was glad that she hadn’t over-worked herself to get some fancy business school degree. That she’d gone off for a lost weekend with a semi-famous pop star, just for fun. I was happy that she’d made it to the Taj Mahal to watch the sunrise with her mom. Suzanne had lived in ways that I had not.
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Chapter 10 Quotes
“I’m just not fulfilled,” I said.
I see now how this must have come across to my mother, who was then in the ninth year of a job she’d taken primarily so she could help finance my college education, after years of not having a job so that she’d be free to sew my school clothes, cook my meals, and do laundry for my dad, who for the sake of our family spent eight hours a day watching gauges on a boiler at the filtration plant.
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Suzanne Alele Character Timeline in Becoming
The timeline below shows where the character Suzanne Alele appears in Becoming. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 6
...home base for Michelle, and she makes many “instant friends” there. One of them is Suzanne Alele, whom Michelle admires for her ease in social situations and her willingness to take...
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Michelle also learns a lot from her friend Suzanne, who often veers between many different activities and quickly changes direction when things aren’t fun....
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Chapter 9
Michelle is still in touch with many friends from school. Suzanne, in particular, is still on a zig-zagging path, trying to optimize the fun in her...
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Suzanne’s cancer, an aggressive form of lymphoma, is the first thing that shakes Michelle’s view that...
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Chapter 10
Suzanne’s sudden death awakens a desire for more joy and meaning in Michelle’s life. She makes...
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