45 pages • 1 hour read
Tara SullivanThe Bitter Side of Sweet
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Character Analysis
Amadou
Fifteen-year-old Amadou is the novel’s protagonist and narrator. Because the story is told from his first-person point of view, the reader gains insight into his thoughts and emotions. Amadou’s primary focus is keeping his younger brother Seydou safe. He works hard each day in the cacao fields so that both of them can escape a beating, and he sticks close to Seydou to watch over him. Even though his protection for Seydou comes from love for his little brother, his words and actions towards Seydou often come across as harsh. After two years on the farm, Amadou has hardened; he is starting to become like the bosses in some respects. For example, when wild Khadija arrives at the farm, he puts himself into the bosses’ shoes and thinks like them about whether they should take her on as a worker. Amadou also wants to prove himself to Moussa and is willing to betray Khadija for a word of praise from the boss.
Guilt plagues Amadou. He feels it’s his fault that Seydou is at the farm, blames himself for the terrible beating Seydou received when they tried to escape, and now feels guilty for failing to protect Khadija from rape. At first, he keeps his guilt inside and isolates himself. However, after escaping and building trust with Khadija, he lets down his guard and voices his feelings of guilt. Both Khadija and Seydou forgive him freely and tell him he is not to blame for the horrible things that happened to them. This marks an important step in his journey towards healing from the emotional wounds the plantation caused.
Amadou also struggles to trust others. So many people have betrayed and mistreated him that he is wary of any acts of kindness. Over his time at the farm, he decided that it’s easier not to care about anyone else. Therefore, he doesn’t make friends with any of the children at the farm. However, that changes when he meets Khadija. Her terrible beatings and rape soften his heart towards her, and he shows her kindness and sympathy. Even though their relationship has a rocky start and he struggles to trust her, he eventually realizes that she cares about him. He is hungry for a friend and relieved to find someone else who looks after Seydou alongside him. Amadou transforms from a hardening, untrusting, guilty, and lonely boy, to someone who is gaining kindness, starting to trust others, seeking forgiveness, and building friendship.
Khadija
Thirteen-year-old Khadija is the first and only girl to come to the cacao farm. Her feisty, fiery spirit earns her the nickname “wildcat” from Amadou as she constantly struggles against the bosses and takes every opportunity to attempt escape. She is brave and clever and uses these attributes to think and act quickly when on the run. For example, when Amadou and Moussa chase her through the bush, she leaves a false trail to throw them off. She later has the idea to sneak onto the pisteur’s truck, and despite the risk of being discovered, bravely executes the clever plan to set up a roadblock as a distraction for the truck driver.
Amadou and Khadija’s relationship initially fluctuates between enmity and friendship. Amadou is quick to blame her for getting him into trouble and for the events that led to Seydou’s injury. However, his anger towards her changes to compassion on the night she is raped. She loses her fiery spirit after the rape, and Amadou takes care of her as best as he can. When Seydou is injured, Khadija stays with him while Amadou is forced to return to the field. These traumatic events for both Khadija and Amadou bring out their compassion for one another and help forge a strong bond between them. When they are forced to harvest cacao while chained together, the chain connecting them symbolizes their complex relationship. At first, the chain pulls each time they move in different directions, but by the end of the day, they are walking in step and working together. The chain symbolizes the friendship, teamwork, and trust they are building.
Sullivan uses Khadija’s character to show how children from wealth are much harder to subdue and enslave than children from poverty. Khadija comes from a wealthy family. She’s accustomed to having a maid, going to school, and living in a nice house. However, all the other children at the farm come from poor villages. Khadija’s constant will to escape shows how wealthy children are more likely to resist enslavement than poor children. The poor came essentially of their own will to make money for their family. They know that if they escape and make it home, their life will not be much better, and they won’t have any money to bring their family. However, Khadija has a better life to return to, which gives her hope and drives her to escape. This shows how traffickers and men like the bosses strategically prey on poor children and easily take advantage of them.
Khadija’s will to escape sparks hope for escape in Amadou. She reminds him that their situation won’t improve of its own accord. The only way to help Seydou and have a chance at a better life is to escape. Khadija is the first close friend Amadou has had at the camp. They look out for each other, and even though it’s a bumpy road, Amadou learns to hope, heal, and trust because of her friendship.
Seydou
At just eight years old, Seydou is the youngest boy on the farm. As Amadou’s little brother, he is under Amadou’s constant care and protection. Even though he appreciates the way Amadou looks out for him, he longs to be trusted by him and given responsibility. However, Amadou limits his independence in the interest of keeping him safe. For example, Amadou teaches Seydou to use the machete as a saw, rather than swinging the blade. However, the sawing motion takes time and means that Seydou cannot meet quota the day he lacks Amadou’s help in the fields. To prove to his brother that he can handle the sharp blade, he uses it improperly to meet quota and even manages to have time to pick some mangoes for Amadou. However, when Amadou finds out how Seydou used the blade, his fear over his brother’s safety shows itself in anger, and Amadou yells at him. Seydou easily gets into troublesome and dangerous situations, so Amadou constantly cleans up his messes, and at times, resents Seydou for his accidental foolishness.
The bosses use Seydou to keep Amadou in line; they know Amadou will not attempt escape as long as Seydou remains on the farm. The only time the boys tried to escape, the bosses whipped Seydou with a bike chain and forced him to say, “This is Amadou’s fault” (110), between each lash. In this way, the bosses used Seydou to break Amadou’s spirit and made him easier to subdue as a slave. Because of his two years on the farm, Seydou has grown up too quickly and lost his youthful, carefree nature. At one point, he even references the plantation as “home,” showing how coming to the farm at a young age has deeply impacted him.
Seydou’s injury and subsequent amputation is one of the catalysts for Amadou’s decision to escape the farm. Although he experiences extreme pain and fever because of his injury, Seydou’s injury steadily improves. Seydou is quick to blame Khadija for his injury, but he is also quick to forgive her. Furthermore, he freely forgives Amadou, saying he’s never blamed him for any of the bad things that happened to them. As Seydou is given chances to prove himself, such as haggling at the market, he thrives, and some of his carefree spirit returns. By the end of the novel, Seydou is blossoming into a lively, cheerful, boy. He is flourishing in school and healing both physically and emotionally.
Moussa
Moussa is one of the three brutal bosses on the cacao farm. He uses violence and intimidation to keep the boys from escaping and to motivate them to harvest enough cacao pods to meet quota. Moussa beats Amadou and Khadija more than once, and Khadija remarks that he and other bosses know how to “break everyone” (111). For example, Moussa uses Amadou’s love and protection for Seydou against him as a punishment by keeping Amadou from watching over Seydou in the fields. Moussa also makes Amadou feel responsible for Seydou’s injury, knowing that it will keep him subdued. Even though Moussa is Amadou’s enemy, Amadou is so hungry for praise and encouragement that he’s willing to betray Khadija’s whereabouts in exchange for words of praise from Moussa.
Although Moussa is cruel, Sullivan plants doubt in the reader’s mind about whether Moussa is completely evil. At times, Moussa seems to have a softer side, such as when he stitches Seydou’s wound and sleeps in the doorway to put himself between Seydou and the other bosses. Amadou’s acknowledgements of Moussa’s small kindnesses suggest that Amadou is hungry for any form of love or kindness and, like Khadija says, trusts Moussa too much.
However, based on Sullivan’s description of the bosses’ house, it’s clear that they do not have much money. She suggests that the bosses are victims of the cacao industry as well. They are hardly paid anything for the seeds they harvest. Even though Moussa’s actions are unquestionably wrong, the reader can see why he and the other bosses use slave labor—they don’t have enough money to pay workers. This shows the complexity of injustice in the cacao industry. Even though the use of unpaid child labor is inexcusable, the victimization of children is just one link at the bottom of the chain. It has trickled down from farther up the chain because of other injustices. Even though Moussa is characterized as evil, Sullivan also creates a sense of compassion for him by hinting at his softer side and showing him to be a victim of the cacao industry.
