{"id":10639,"date":"2026-02-16T01:43:38","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T01:43:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/?p=10639"},"modified":"2026-02-21T19:47:51","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T19:47:51","slug":"dont-look-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/2026\/02\/16\/dont-look-back\/","title":{"rendered":"Don’t Look Back"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Don’t Look Back<\/em> is a memoir written specifically for Young Readers by Achut Deng and Keely Hutton. The memoir itself is Achut’s, but she chose Keely as a co-author because, as stated in the author’s note, she “wanted to be paired with a seasoned author to help tell her story.” For some context, the book follows Achut from the beginning of her life, living in a small South Sudanese village, through her time as a refugee from the second South Sudanese civil war, to the present, where she lives and works in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Note: Achut is pronounced “uh-CHOOT”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My Experience<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I didn’t really have any concrete expectations going into this book, but as I was reading, I felt much more grounded compared to my previous experiences with memoirs, historical fiction, and the like. Usually, reading stories similar in nature to Don’t Look Back<\/em>, I am so immersed that they become just that—stories. Fiction. And, in some cases, they are, but my point is that it doesn’t always sink in completely that these stories are either based on true events or are <\/em>accounts of true events. But Don’t Look Back<\/em> was different. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I mentioned this briefly in class, but I wanted to bring it up again because of the role it played in my experience with the story: my mom had the opportunity to meet Achut Deng in February 2025. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My mom, Jennifer, is an eighth grade reading teacher. One of the units she does with her students is all about stories of people who have overcome obstacles. Part of the unit is lit circles; students in small groups choose a book from the vast and ever-expanding list that my mom has curated, and they have weekly discussions while my mom observes. The Fall semester of the 2023 — 2024 school year was the first time my mom offered Don’t Look Back <\/em>as a choice for her students’ lit circle groups. Only two girls were interested in the book, which was a smaller group than she usually allows, but she made an exception because she was excited to have a group reading it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later that year, my mom decided to nominate Achut for Author of the Year for the South Dakota Council of Teachers of English. Achut won the award, but because my family had to be out of state for a memorial service, my mom wasn’t able to attend the ceremony. Instead, she and the two girls who read the book for their lit circle created a short video that was played during the ceremony luncheon to introduce Achut before she delivered her acceptance speech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After that, my mom thought little of it until a school day in late February 2025. She’d been downstairs in the school’s front office for some reason or another and she noticed a “strikingly beautiful” (her words) woman walking into the school. But she had to get back to her classroom, so she said goodbye to the secretaries and left. In the hallway, a colleague stopped her and said that the principal had been looking for her. Apparently, there was a guest here to see her. Mystified, my mom changed her course for principal’s office and, when she got there, she was met, not only by the principal, Mr. Foster, but also by the woman she’d noticed earlier. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Immediately, my mom began panicking, trying to figure out which of her students’ mothers this could be. She introduced herself cautiously, and when the woman shook my mom’s hand, she said, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s nice to meet you. I am Achut Deng.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With her, she’d brought a bouquet of flowers and a signed copy of her book as a gift for my mom. She explained that she’d been so touched by the video my mom and her students had made that she was determined to meet her. She found out what school my mom taught at—Mickelson Middle School in Brookings, SD (go bobcats!)—and worked with the principal to arrange a surprise meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Achut had also been hoping to meet the students who had helped with the video, but my mom explained that they’d been eighth graders at the time, and were now freshmen at the high school, therefore not in the building. To her surprise, Achut offered to come back another day to surprise the girls, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the time being, though, my mom sat in the principal’s office with Achut and had what I imagine was an extremely meaningful conversation. I remember that, while recounting this all to me later on, my mom had been having a pretty rough day until this surprise. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Achut Deng (left), Jennifer Lacher-Starace (right) | February 2025<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

All of that being said, I think that, because I’m only one degree of separation away from the author—who’s also the “main character” of the story—it was more apparent to me, as I was reading, that this story was real<\/em>. Furthermore, although there were plenty of times that Achut’s life was endangered, I was able to conquer the fear I was feeling for her because I know that she survived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Classifying my Experience<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Reading a memoir as opposed to a work of fiction is certainly a different process and experience; I couldn’t really find anything in our class’s glossary that fit. The best way that I can describe my experience reading Don’t Look Back<\/em> is the feeling of being grounded<\/strong>, in that, although I was highly invested in the plot and development of the story, I felt more sensibly connected to it than I do when I read other books. Typically, if I’m really enjoying whatever book I’m reading (which is often some kind of fantasy, magical realism, adventure, or romance), I get swept up into whatever universe is at play—sort of like immersion<\/strong>, defined in our experiences glossary as: “Absorbing or engrossing involvement in a story. You might feel as though you\u2019ve been swallowed by the story.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That wasn’t exactly the case with Don’t Look Back<\/em>. I was invested in the story, not only because of excellent craftmanship and use of narrative technologies, but also because I felt connected to the author. The narrative in Don’t Look Back<\/em> was absolutely compelling, but as I was reading, I was eminently aware that the world Achut was describing wasn’t a fantasyland or alternate universe; it was the same world we live in now. Furthermore, Achut presently resides in a city that’s less than an hour’s drive from my hometown; in true, small-town, Midwestern fashion, I think of her as a member of my community. I feel a little silly saying that, since I’ve never actually met her, but I think that’s sort of a testament to Midwestern\/South Dakotan culture—or maybe just human nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is all to uphold my classification of my experience as grounding<\/strong>. Instead of being swept away into the story’s world, I felt an acute sense of pragmatism throughout the process of reading, which made the narrative all the more touching. And, honestly, I’m not sure that I’ve ever had this experience before—at least, certainly not to this extent. Somehow, the grounded-ness I felt reading Don’t Look Back<\/em> sort of helped me relate Achut’s emotional and developmental experiences to my own life. Although I can’t say I’ve lived anywhere near the same life as Achut, or faced any of the same hardships she has, I am as much a human on this earth as she is—as we all are. I don’t think it’s fair to compare our tragedies or struggles as a means of validating or invalidating our feelings. We’re all just trying to live. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Features and Narrative Technologies that Prompted my Experience<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For as powerful a book as Don’t Look Back<\/em>, I’ve been feeling like I need to come up with something equally as powerful to convey how important I think this book is. But I had a pretty unique experience with Don’t Look Back<\/em>; I don’t think “profound” is necessarily the best or most effective route to take with this assignment\/reflection. In fact, the narrative technology that I’ve found to be most related to my experience is a pretty simple one: I Voice<\/strong>—the authors’ use of first person narration. It makes sense that a memoir would be told from first person point of view, but the reason that this technology had such an influence on my experience with the book, over the others in the glossary, at least, is related to my connection to the author, one-sided as it may be. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reading Don’t Look Back<\/em> felt a little bit like hearing a story from a friend, as though they were telling me about their day or something that happened to them. In addition to the I Voice<\/strong>, the language and syntax in the book was simple in that it was easy to follow and connect with; the book was written specifically with Young Readers in mind. The structure of the story was so easily digestible that the content became even more impactful for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part of the reason that I struggled to come up with any other narrative technologies, I think, is because this book is a memoir. It wasn’t as though the authors were conceiving subplots and crafting character arcs the way a fiction author might; this is simply the story of Achut’s life. It sort of doesn’t feel right to talk about Poetic Justice, or Revenge, or Soliloquy, or what have you in the context of Don’t Look Back<\/em>. If this was a fictional story about a made-up character who was experiencing the same historical events as Achut, then yes, there would be intentional narrative technologies at play in order to prompt readers to have specific responses to the book. But this isn’t fictional, it’s the story of Achut’s life. And life isn’t planned or plotted out, it just happens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Extra<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As I’m finishing this, I wanted to circle back to something I mentioned earlier: Another part of my experience with the book was that, because I knew Achut survived, some of the fear I felt initially at certain parts of the story subsided. I experience this a lot with TV shows; right now, I’m watching Supernatural, which has, like, 15 seasons. I’m in the middle of season 7, and the main characters’ lives are pretty much constantly endangered. Whenever I’m feeling anxious or nervous or fearful for them, I remind myself that they have to survive in at least some form, since there’s still eight seasons left. They can’t just permanently kill off one of the two protagonists (I hope). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the case of Don’t Look Back<\/em>, this experience is a little different, because it’s based in the real world (unlike Supernatural, which is fictional—go figure). I think this experience was related to my connection to the author, but was more so an aspect of reading a memoir. I’m not sure what to call it, but I thought it was at least worth mentioning\/expanding on a little bit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Featured Image<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Cover of Don’t Look Back<\/em>. Design by Mallory Gregg. Square Fish. All rights reserved. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Don’t Look Back is a memoir written specifically for Young Readers by Achut Deng and Keely Hutton. The memoir itself is Achut’s, but she chose Keely as a co-author because, as stated in the author’s note, she “wanted to be paired with a seasoned author to help tell her story.” For some context, the book […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":936,"featured_media":10640,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[240],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-post-2","has-thumbnail"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/936"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10639"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10639\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10820,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10639\/revisions\/10820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unewhavendh.org\/immigrant-literature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}