Benny Was Such An Intriguing Character Through Her Cycles Of Loneliness And Longing For Acceptance What Did You Enjoy Most About Writing Her
I enjoyed writing about the small ways in which Benny, this imposing, sometimes brash woman is, at the core, still the open-hearted and instinctive girl that she always was. She has a visceral reaction to things like color and texture in art and food. At one point, after a very difficult month, the thing that causes Benny to burst into tears is the sight of a certain color.
Who Is One Author You Wish More Readers Knew About
Louise Erdrich. Actually, shes a bestselling, prize-winning writer of prose and poetry, but I have friends and family whove never read her work. She has a way of pinning down difficult social and political situations, in particular regarding indigenous peoples in America, while telling stories of families and communities with great love and humor.
What Are Three Books Are You Most Looking Forward To Reading In 2022 And Why
Manifesto: On Never Giving Up by Bernardine Evaristo. I loved her voice in the Booker Prize-winning book, Girl, Woman, Other and Im curious about her personal reflections as a writer working today.
Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka. The story promises an unusual perspective on a serial killer told from the point of view of women whose lives were linked to his.
And The Good Left Undone by Adriana Trigiani. Its about a Tuscan family of artisans with long-held secrets. Sounds lush and intriguing, plus I live in Italy.
Related:
Also Check: Black And Gold Graduation Cakes
What Kind Of Reader Were You As A Child Are There Any Books Or Characters You Love Returning To
I read everything, from the books I could swipe off my parents shelves to the childrens books that I would read over and over again. I moved to Jamaica as a child and still have a favorite book from that time: Anancy and Miss Lou by Louise Bennett. The stories center around a lovable rascal named Anancy. The character is based on the folk tales of the West African spider god.
Untold Stories Shape Peoples Lives Both When They Are Withheld And When They Are Revealed You Wrote Why Was This A Theme You Wanted To Write About
I come from a multicultural family where few of us, over the course of three generations, have had quite the same upbringing. Also, Ive moved quite a bit in my own life. So, I do a lot of thinking about identity, and our concepts of home and family. I am fascinated by how stories that are handed down from one generation to another help us to develop a sense of identity, and how those ideas can shift over time, especially when new stories come to the fore.
Related: Black Booksellers Recommend 25 Books to Read During Black History Month and Beyond
Recommended Reading: Good Large Breed Puppy Food
Your Mother Died Now She Wants To Tell You Her Secrets
Charmaine Wilkersons debut novel, Black Cake, shows how many times a woman can cook up a new life and what happens when she runs out of steam.
-
Send any friend a story
As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Anyone can read what you share.
Give this articleGive this articleGive this article
Welcome to Group Text, a monthly column for readers and book clubs about the novels, memoirs and short-story collections that make you want to talk, ask questions and dwell in another world for a little bit longer.
________
A brother and sister learn the truth about their mother only when its too late to ask questions. Now they have to figure out how, when and with whom to carry out her last wish.
Black Cake explores the ways we use meals not just to nourish ourselves but to help tell unspeakable stories. Family, food, festering resentment youll find plenty to chew on.
In every kitchen, theres at least one cooking implement that means more to its owners than the food they cook with it. Maybe its a humble cast-iron pan, called into omelet service on Saturday mornings, or a pineapple-shaped cutting board inherited from an old roommate who made the best guacamole. In my moms kitchen, the unsung hero is an ancient mixing bowl orange on the outside, white on the inside used to bake five decades worth of macaroni and cheese from a recipe perfected by my grandfather. Some families have crystal and caviar ours has Pyrex and elbow noodles.
Reviewed By Liberty Martin
Last Christmas, I helped my grandmother make black cake for the first time. This was serious business, an operation that covered my grandmas living room and kitchen with vat-sized mixing bowls and various ingredients in order to make cakes for family and church members. Charmaine Wilkerson conjures similar scenes in her debut novel Black Cake, in which a deceased Caribbean woman named Eleanor Bennett leaves a black cake and a lengthy audio recording filled with secrets for her adult children, Byron and Benny.
Thus, Eleanors black cake recipeone of the few things from her past that she could pass onto her childrenserves as an expected symbol of heritage and how it can be disrupted or transformed by immigration. From Byrons point of view, Wilkerson writes, Mas cake was a work of art the moist, loamy mouthful, the tang of spirits behind the nose. But Bryon had never shared his parents emotional attachment to the recipe. Tradition, his ma used to say.
However, Wilkerson never specifies where this tradition is from. Sure, Eleanor Bennett is from the Caribbean, but the Caribbean is an archipelago of islands, each with their own traditions and customs. The missing island name becomes a black hole that renders the emotional weight of identity and diaspora hollow. Whenever Eleanor bakes black cake for her children, she tells them, This is your heritage. What kind of heritage does not have a name?
Don’t Miss: Steak And Kidney Pies For Sale