Jun 5

Jun 5 The Vanishing Half

Author: Brit Bennett
Publisher: Riverhead
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

Click above to buy this book from my Bookshop.org shop, which supports independent bookstores (not Amazon). You can also find it via your favorite indie bookstore here.

Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it's not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it's everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters' storylines intersect?

Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passing. Looking well beyond issues of race, The Vanishing Half considers the lasting influence of the past as it shapes a person's decisions, desires, and expectations, and explores some of the multiple reasons and realms in which people sometimes feel pulled to live as something other than their origins.

TL;DR Review

The Vanishing Half is a perfectly paced novel with big, full characters and a story that doesn’t let you go. Yes, I am late to the game. Yes, it’s worth your time.

For you if: You are looking for literary fiction that feels easier to read without sacrificing quality.

Full Review

“A town always looked different once you'd returned, like a house where all the furniture had shifted three inches. You wouldn't mistake it for a stranger's house but you'd keeping banging your shins on the table corners.”

My friends: When a book is filled with similes like that ^^, you just know you’re in for a treat. I am obviously extremely late to the game with this book (it sold one million copies in one year!!), but please allow me to add my voice to its praise anyway.

Quick synopsis, for those of you unfamiliar: The book centers on a pair of twins, Stella and Desiree. They’re Black but have very light skin, and one day in the 1950s Stella leaves Desiree and her entire life behind to marry a charming, rich white man and grab her chance to live as a white woman. Years later, Desiree returns to their hometown with her daughter, Jude, fleeing an abusive husband and still reckoning with Stella’s desertion. We also get chapters told years later from Jude’s perspective, which (as you can guess) brings our characters back together in some way.

It’s hard to say what, exactly, makes this book so good. I think it’s just a beautifully balanced total package — characters, setting, prose, conflict, emotion. I rooted so hard for so many of these characters. The book is sweeping and literary but readable and engaging, full of sharp details and super-quotable passages. I also didn’t realize that this book had trans representation, and I thought it was really beautifully done. Also, the audiobook’s narration is excellent — it’s absolutely worth a listen.

I can’t wait to see what HBO does with this one. I have a feeling it’s going to be excellent.