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Brit Bennett Books

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The Mothers

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Meet Claudie

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“Why can’t you just be yourself?” Stella asked once. “Maybe I don’t know who that is,” her daughter shot back. And Stella understood, she did. That was the thrill of youth, the idea that you could be anyone. That was what had captured her in the charm shop, all those years ago. Then adulthood came, your choices solidifying, and you realize that everything you are had been set in motion years before. The rest was aftermath. So she understood why her daughter was searching for a self, and she even blamed herself for it.”

SelfFamilyIdentityExpectationsAdolescenceConditioningReinventionYoung AdultsSearch For Self
Book:The Vanishing Half
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“She closed her eyes, trying to remember the photos that had hung on the walls. She had passed these pictures every day, but now she only remembered them vaguely--her parents on their wedding day, her mother in a garden, her family at Knott's Berry Farm. How had she not memorized them? Or maybe she had once but she was beginning to forget. Did the house smell different because her mother's scent was gone? Or had she just forgotten how her mother smelled?”

MotherGriefSenses
Book:The Mothers
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“Some hoped, watching Desiree hold the hand of the little dark girl, that the two wouldn't even stay that long. They weren't used to having a dark child amongst them and were surprised by how much it upset them. Each time that girl passed by, no hat or nothing, they were as galled as when Thomas Richard returned from the war, half a leg lighter, and walked around town with one pant leg pinned back so that everyone could see his loss. If nothing could be done about ugliness, you ought to at least look like you were trying to hide it.”

SocietyPrejudiceSocial ExpectationsVanity Of Life
Book:The Vanishing Half
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“Barry prided himself on his ability to keep his lives separate. . . He was Bianca on two Saturday nights a month, and otherwise, he pushed her out of sight, even though he thought about her, shopped for her, planned for her eventual return. Barry went to faculty meetings and family reunions and church, Bianca always lingering on the edge of his mind. She had her role to play and Barry had his. You could live a life this way, split. As long as you knew who was in charge.”

SocietyIdentityGenderDrag
Book:The Vanishing Half
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“Some hoped, watching Desiree hold the hand of the little dark girl, that the two wouldn't even stay that long. They weren't used to having a dark child amongst them and were surprised by how much it upset them. Each time that girl passed by, no hat or nothing, they were as galled as when Thomas Richard returned from the war, half a leg lighter, and walked around town with one pant leg pinned back to that everyone could see his loss. If nothing could be done about ugliness, you ought to at least look like you were trying to hide it.”

SocietyPrejudiceVanitySocial Expectations
Book:The Vanishing Half
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“After all, before you could play a song, you had to learn each note of the scale. A newspaper article was made up of smaller words. Even baking a cake required smaller steps, like cracking eggs in a bowl or measuring out flour. Maybe Claudie had been going about this all wrong. Maybe if she focused on the smaller steps, she could work her way toward being good at something.”

InspirationalTalentHard WorkTalentsSkillSkill DevelopmentAmerican GirlAmerican Girl ClaudieDiscovering Your Talents
Book:Meet Claudie
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“The twins had always seemed both blessed and cursed; they'd inherited, from their mother, the legacy of an entire town, and from their father, a legacy hollowed by loss. Four Vignes boys, all dead by thirty. The eldest collapsed in a chain gang from heatstroke; the second gassed in a Belgian trench; the third stabbed in a bar fight; and the youngest, Leon Vignes, lynched twice, the first time at home while his twin girls watched through a crack in the closet door, hands clamped over each other's mouths until their palms were misted with spit.”

DualityRacial Violence20th Century Black History
Book:The Vanishing Half
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