Started Reading: December 12, 2024
Finished Reading: December 24, 2024
I have read 100% of this book
Verdict: Enjoyed it! (4 of 5 stars)
One of my favorite books of my 2024 reading, for sure. The Vanishing Half spans the lives of twin girls and their daughters after the twins run away from their tiny Louisiana village--populated by light-skinned black locals--and end up diverging onto two very separate paths in life. Both light enough to "pass," only one choosing to do so and building her life on a lie. Two daughters who grow up as different as night and day, "blue black" and California blonde, both daughters knowing they'll never truly know their mothers as individuals because they will never know them as a pair.
Bennett jumps through decades and from one voice to another so skillfully, I truly felt like every character was fleshed out nicely. So difficult to do well! Even the pieces from the points of view of male characters Early and Reese read as genuine.
I love that the author explores themes of mother/daughter relationships through Deiree and Jude, Stella and Kennedy, and Desiree and Adele, rather than just with the twins and their children. Sometimes as parents, there are nuances and truths about our love for our kids that we don't understand until later in life when we examine our relationships with our own parents. The LGBTQ issue is also handled so lovingly and without a hint of the lewdness that can sometimes bleed through even the most sensitive of stories trying to depict the demographic as multi-faceted humans dealing with the inner tempests we all have to weather.
I'm not sure why I waited as long as I did to read this book. I think maybe the cover art and vague, slightly disjointed summary didn't do it justice. While the first few chapters were a bit slow for me, I was honestly rapt by how the twins' lives diverged and contrasted, and how their origins colored their relationships with their daughters so differently.