| | 
|
|
 |
|
Half a Heart
Rosellen Brown. Farrar Straus & Giroux: 2000 (paperback). ISBN: 0374299870. 401 pages.
Guide not available
|
| |
|
Here's a "mother-daughter" book with a few unusual twists. The mother in
question is Miriam Vener, a wealthy Jewish Houston suburbanite, mistress of a luxurious home, wife to a successful,
sensitive, supportive man, mother to three healthy and happy children. But as we learn in the novel's first pages, Miriam
feels suffocated by all of it--by the lifestyle, the house, the husband, even by the much-adored children. For Miriam has
another child, a daughter she hasn't seen in 17 years, Veronica, the product of Miriam's long-ago affair with a brilliant
black musician during the last official gasp of the civil rights movement in Missisippi. Just as Miriam becomes convinced
that she can't live for another day without seeing Veronica's face, she gets a letter from her estranged daughter, who
reveals that she, too, has been thinking a lot about the lost relationship. Overjoyed, Miriam plans a reunion weekend with
her daughter, unaware that Veronica's motives for restoring the relationship are quite different than her own. Despite the
best laid plans of each woman to manage the weekend to suit her own agenda, their new-found relationship quickly takes on
an unplanned, unexpected life of its own. Excellent, insightful writing and convincing characters keep this one real, and
distinguish it from many of the overly sentimental, overly sensational narratives of a similar kind.
|
| |
| |
contact us
