Review by Booklist Review
There isn't a box big enough to contain this debut novel. Poet, writer, and actress Daley-Ward ventured into the world of fiction and created a genre of her own. Twins Clara and Dempsey, allegedly identical but as different as two people can be, lost their mother when they were infants. Thirty years later, Clara meets a woman in a department store who shares their mother's name, looks, and history. It doesn't matter that this woman seems to be the same age as Clara and Dempsey--Clara is convinced she is their mother. Dempsey believes she is a con artist. In the same way that Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" cycles through a ballad, opera, and hard rock, Daley-Ward melds surrealism and sf with contemporary fiction and a sprinkling of titillating romance. Along the way, she explores the many dimensions of Black female identity, with a special focus on how Black female mental health is often ignored or mistreated. In the first title in Liveright's Well-Read Black Girls Books series, chosen by WRBG founder Glory Edim, Daley-Ward illuminates the complex workings of the mind in a tale filled with intrigue and speculation that will leaves readers guessing long after the final pages.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Poet Daley-Ward (Bone) makes her fiction debut with an engrossing and off-kilter tale of twin sisters and their mother, a Black woman who left them when they were infants in 1995 London. Clara and Dempsey were adopted by different families after a dead body found on the banks of the Thames was identified as their mother, Serene (their father's identity was unknown). Now, at 30, Clara is a successful novelist who drinks too much and has meaningless sex, while Dempsey is a reclusive data entry worker who relies on an unorthodox life coach. When Clara sees a woman who looks just like the Serene she knows from photos, she's convinced the woman is her and Dempsey's mother, but there's one catch: the stranger appears to be 30, the age Serena was when she disappeared. Clara and the stranger fall into an intriguing push-pull relationship; Clara hopes to take care of her, but she says Clara is the one who "seem a little lost." When Clara claims to Dempsey that their mother has reappeared, Dempsey worries that the woman is an opportunistic imposter. In chapters from the perspective of aspiring writer Serene in 1995, the reader gains insight into the reasons behind her departure. The dreamy novel is propelled by searching questions about how to be a mother and how to find fulfillment. It's a singular family drama. Agent: Marya Spence, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (June)
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Review by Library Journal Review
DEBUT Twins Clara and Dempsey are 30-year-old Black women living in London. Their mother, Serene, left them with a sitter one night when they were small children and never returned; her clothes were later found beside the River Thames. In the aftermath, Clara and Dempsey were adopted into separate families (neither of them nurturing) but maintained some contact with each other. Now Clara is a prosperous debut author on a book tour where she doesn't feel in control; Dempsey, overly concerned about other people's opinions and frequently taken advantage of, spends much of her time alone in her tiny flat. Clara encounters a woman she believes is their mother, but this woman seemingly hasn't aged a day and has enjoyed a child-free life. This forces the sisters to reevaluate how they view themselves, their relationships, and their shared history. Award-winning poet and memoirist Daley-Ward's (The Terrible: A Storyteller's Memoir) first novel flits around in kaleidoscopic time, narrated in turns by Clara, Dempsey, and Serene, each with a distinct perspective, none of them objective. VERDICT The first work in Liveright's Well-Read Black Girl Books line (a collaboration with the book club founded by Glory Edim) is recommended for readers who appreciate finely wrought descriptions of people, places, and moments in time and are open to redefining what constitutes a happy ending.--Judy Poyer
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
An inventive novel about family from a risk-taking writer. Daley-Ward memorably played with structure in her memoir,The Terrible (2018), which combined prose and poetry to tell the story of her fraught childhood and young adulthood. Her debut novel finds her using a similar toolbox, but in a very new way. The book follows 30-year-old twin sisters Clara, a writer whose debut novel is making literary waves, and Dempsey, who works an uninspiring administrative job. The two aren't close, and haven't been since they were adopted into different families as children after their mother was found dead on the bank of the Thames. Clara was "the chosen one," welcomed into a wealthy family, while Dempsey was adopted by a single man, a member of the local council--the twins are, as Clara says, "opposite halves of a strange truth, both born from a force unknown." Clara is shocked when she sees a woman shoplifting at a department store and believes it's her long-dead mother, Serene, somehow brought back as a 30-year-old with no children. Clara stalks the woman, and they eventually become friends, to the horror of Dempsey, who thinks her sister--a prolific drinker--is losing her mind. The novel switches perspectives between Clara, convinced that she's found her mother, and Dempsey, just trying to live her life, as Clara and the mystery woman enter into a bizarre and intense relationship. Daley-Ward explores the tension between the twins beautifully, with Dempsey struggling to pull her sister from the brink; both harbor barely concealed grudges against the other. ("Sometimes, I could happily decapitate my sister," muses Dempsey at one point; not long after, Clara thinks, "Sometimes, I could happily strangle Dempsey.") The novel ends with a genuine shock, but it's earned--it's a surprising conclusion to a beautifully written and structured book. Elegant and unpredictable in the best possible way. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
