Tag: Black lives

James – book review

James, by Percival Everett

Do you think you know the story of Huck Finn? Think again. In this marvelous book by Percival Everett, the adventure is turned on its head and you find yourself reading a totally different story that seems to come tumbling out from between the lines of Twain’s. It’s still an adventure story, in which a boy called Huck and a slave he calls Jim run away by floating down the Mississippi river and get into all sorts of trouble, but this time the point of view belongs to James. The pair become true friends, they look out for each other, care for each other, discuss ideas and try to see the other’s point of view, but the world is different when the one telling the story is a piece of property which needs to be returned to its owner.

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The Fraud – book review

The Fraud, by Zadie Smith

The Fraud is an ambitious book, not one to take lightly. It encompasses the true story of an identity fraud trial in the 1800s, where a man returning from the colonies supposes to be not an East End butcher, but the lost son of a wealthy family. The family say he isn’t. Others, including a loyal black servant and the masses, believe he is.

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Americanah – book review

Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

What is it, to be an Americanah? That’s the question at the core of this wonderfully rich story, along with other such essential questions, such as what is it to be foreign in America or Britain? What hold does a country have over prospective immigrants, how is it perpetuated? How are different cultures and races valued? And of course, as at the heart of any great novel, how does love work?

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The Vanishing Half—book review

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

This is a story about twin teenage girls who escape small town life and head for the city. It is about identity and judgement and racism is on every page, much of it ostensibly black on black though the lynching of the girls’ father shows this colour preoccupation is far more than cosmetic in the context of 1950s Louisiana. There’s a lot in this small book.

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