"Black Cake" by Charmaine Wilkerson.
This is, essentially, the life story of Eleanor Bennett as told by her in a recorded letter to two of her children.
The story uses multiple locations, the Caribbean, America, Italy, England, and Black Cake takes a central role.
Numerous themes are crammed into the plot, including family, swimming as a sport, surfing, the nature of identity, racism, gambling.
The book reads like a detective story with the nature of a murder not being revealed until several hundred pages after the event.
The book was generally well received by club members but with many divergent opinions. Comments made include (positively):
- Enjoyed the name change from Mabel to Marble.
And negatively:
- The book was too long, it needed “a good edit".
- It has an almost Dickensian complexity, impossible to track if reading on Kindle.
- The UK locations were insufficiently researched, with no mention of Notting Hill in London, and the Edinburgh reference should have been to the port of Leith.
- The nature of academia was not well addressed.
A couple of members were unable to come to the meeting sent the following:
My two-penn'orth: I enjoyed skating through this.
I did wonder at the beginning what was going on, but when it got into the groove of revelations from beyond the grave, you kind of knew what to expect and looked forward to seeing what happened next,
and indeed who the characters would turn out to have morphed into.
We had a forced adoption in last month's book, and another one at Vicky Dock book club in Philomena by Martin Sixsmith!
Some of the plot lines move on too quickly, for instance Eleanor was no sooner woo'd and wed than her horrible hubby was Murdered by Cake.
As a result many of the characters left you wanting more depth.”
Just a quick review
- I loved this book. I found the characters interesting, if not always likeable.
- The story was mostly good, though I had to suspend my disbelief at times but it's fiction.
- I loved the cake how it was the one thing from home and how it connected the future, though once ahead I had to suspend my disbelief again.
- The whole family ended having a problem with talking honestly and accepting other ways of being.
When the daughter was honest it was disaster.
All those wasted years.
- I especially loved the maid and the swimming friend, so glad she kept swimming.
Doorly score: 3.4
PC. 11th May 2023
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