Caucasia: A Novel |
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| Title: | Caucasia: A Novel |
| Author: | Danzy Senna |
| Publisher: | Riverhead Trade |
| Type: | Book / Paperback |
| Publication Date: | 01 February, 1999 |
| ISBN / ISBN-13: | 1573227161 / 9781573227162 |
| List Price: | $15.00 |
| You Save: | $4.80 |
| Amazon Price: | $10.20 |
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This book is also available, brand-new, from 3rd-party marketplace sellers at Amazon.com, from $7.40.
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Editorial Review / Publisher's Information:
Product Description
"Lucid and magnificent." --James McBride, author of The Color of Water
"Senna's remarkable first novel [will] cling to your memory. There's Birdie, who takes after her mother's white, New England side of the family--light skin, straight hair. There's her big sister, Cole, who takes after her father, a radical black intellectual. It's the early seventies, and black-power politics divide their parents, who divide the sisters; Cole disappears with their father, and Birdie goes underground with their mother...Senna tells this coming-of-age tale with impressive beauty and power." --Newsweek
"[An] absorbing debut novel...Senna superbly illustrates the emotional toll that politics and race take on one especially gutsy young girl's development as she makes her way through the parallel limbos between black and white and between girl and young woman...Senna gives new meaning to the twin universal desires for a lost childhood and a new adult self by recounting Birdie's struggle to become someone when she can look and act like anyone." --New York Times Book Review
"Brilliant...a finely nuanced story that explores the matter of race through the eyes and heart of another white black girl."--Ms.
Amazon.com Review
A young girl learns some difficult lessons in Danzy Senna's debut novel Caucasia. Growing up in a biracial family in 1970s Boston, Birdie has seen her family disintegrate due to the increasing racial tensions. Her father and older sister move to Brazil, where they hope to find true racial equality, while Birdie and her mother drift through the country, eventually adopting new identities (Sheila and Jesse Goldman) and settling in a small New Hampshire town. Birdie/Jesse tries to find her niche in this new world of eye shadow and gossip and boys, but she also wants to remain true to herself and find a common ground between her white and black heritage. She sets out to find her sister and reconnect with that part of her that has been lost for so long; the search takes her far from the settled, safe life she had in New Hampshire to a far more ambiguous, and unsettled, existence, one in which her own definitions of herself become muddled, and her search for her sister leads ultimately to a search for her own true identity.
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Customer Reviews:
• Great Read
06 April, 2009
This Nook, was an excellent read. I read this book, as a requirement for school,and I found it very interesting. I got this book at a great price, and I'll be keeping it in my collecting and recommending it to others.
- Amazon Customer Review
• Still With Me After Almost 10 Years
24 August, 2009
One of my college English professors assigned this book to my Great Books II class. Being from birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement and having race equality stuffed down our throats at every turn, my friends and I were a little hesitant to read this book. However, it turned out to be one of the greatest books I have ever read. And almost 10 years later, I am still recommending this book to my literary friends. Caucasia truly is one of the greatest books I have ever read. I might go so far as to say it is my favorite. Read it! You won't regret it!
- Amazon Customer Review
• Explores More Than Race
29 March, 2010
Most certainly, Caucasia is focused on the issue of race, and its reality for both the individual and society especially when racial identity is not clearly reflected in appearance. But this book's sensitive and even-handed treatment of the 1970's in the US also extends to the complexities of the secondary themes of social class, truth and family. Mom is a New England blue blood but turns her back on her background, except when she needs money. Is she really in danger from the feds or isn't she? When is lying justified and when isn't it? And what about family relationships should be strongly defended and what is properly subject to ephemeral circumstances?
Why only four stars? Sometimes the intimate details of the main character's childhood and adolescent concerns felt overdone and repetitive. On the other hand, the plot line is strong and the writing graceful. A worthwhile read.
- Amazon Customer Review
• How Do You Define A Person?
05 September, 2009
I am interested in books that discuss race and identity and so decided to give this book. Danzy Senna created a civil rights era masterpiece that makes you question the construct of race.
If for all intensive purposes someone believes someone to be one race and treats them fair and likes them and then they find out that person is another race and then despises them, for what basis should we give them this change of heart?
Does the color of one's skin tell you everything you need to know a person. Should a person be perceived first by that color and secondly by their nature? What if they can pass? What if they decide to pass? Are they ashamed of who they are? Or are they just hoping to live a safe life free from persecution due to their race?
This book makes you think. What would you do in this situation? The Civil Rights Era was a time where race consciousness came to a head. People fought and bandied together to create equality. People of all races came together with the determination to show that all should be treated the same.
It's a lesson that should be remembered today. This book is an excellent novel to use as a dialogue to yourself and those around you about how you define a person!
- Amazon Customer Review
• So So Book
20 December, 2009
I had to read this book for a class and it was a complete waste of my time. The author mixes up the historical facts she tries to highlight as important and does not end the book. It is very clear that this was a first effort and the book had a rookie editor as well.
If you don't care about technical details being correct and don't mind a very childish writing style, you should like this book. Just don't expect an ending, because it is not there in any shape or form. And as a bi-racial person who grew up during the times portrayed, I was very very disappointed. As a scholar, I was even more dismayed that this is being passed off as well written.
- Amazon Customer Review
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