Red Island house A novel

Andrea Lee, 1953-

Book - 2021

"Gorgeously evocative, Red Island House follows two decades in the life of Shay, an African-American professor whose husband Senna, a brash and wealthy Italian businessman, builds her a dream house in Madagascar."--

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FICTION/Lee, Andrea
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Subjects
Genres
Domestic fiction
Published
New York : Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc 2021.
Language
English
Main Author
Andrea Lee, 1953- (author)
Edition
First Scribner hardcover edition
Physical Description
276 pages ; 24 cm
ISBN
9781982137809
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Review by Booklist Review

In her first book in 15 years, Lee asks, can an African American be a colonizer? Shay, an accomplished Black literature professor, is captivated by Senna, an Italian adventurer. They build a life together in Madagascar, a dream investment for Senna, but an emotionally fraught one for Shay, who feels a kinship with the islanders which her husband has no interest in exploring. In a series of linked short stories, Lee reveals Shay's growing connection to this most isolated of African countries, and her discomfort with the crass, exploitative Europeans who have made it their private playground while "clinging to their illusions of superiority." As the descendant of American plantation owners and enslaved people, she sees this expatriate paradise as rooted in "a tale of rapine disguised by lofty dreams; a theme not unique to Madagascar but also buried in the history of her own family, her America." Yet Shay's position will always be ambiguous, for "her brown skin and her American expansiveness lend her a false sense of familiarity with the people of color around her . . . , whose language she doesn't speak, and whose values and motives she will never fully understand." Brilliant and tragic.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Lee's seductive novel (her first in 15 years, after Lost Hearts in Italy) chronicles the life of Shay Gilliam, a Black American woman married to an Italian man. Her husband, Senna, builds the couple a vacation property and pension in northwestern Madagascar. It takes a while for Shay to adjust during visits from Italy, where Shay teaches literature, but she befriends head housekeeper Bertine, whom Shay enlists to help her get rid of loud, racist Kristos, the house manager. As the decades pass, the couple raises children and continues to visit. Meanwhile, various episodes in Madagascar occupy Shay, including a feud between a volatile bar owner and an ostentatious business rival who appears to be "living out some Happy Valley colonial fantasy." (One of the two ends up dead.) Shay also has an unsettling encounter while searching for a "sacred tree," and develops a "strange intimacy" with the skipper of the couple's decrepit catamaran. These experiences lead Shay to confront ideas about race, class, and colonialism. If the plotting is episodic, the writing is vivid: "the first caress of tropical air" is "like an infant's hand on the face," and Shay's fond reflections on Bertine are especially moving. Things ebb and flow, but the overall impact is quietly powerful. (Mar.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review

While it is classified as a novel, the latest offering from Lee (Russian Journal) is more like a series of related, beautifully written vignettes centering on life and culture in Madagascar. Each vignette includes Shay, a Black literature professor who vacations in Madagascar with her husband Senna, a wealthy Italian executive who has built his dream house in the tropical island paradise. Senna revels in his role as lord of the manor, employing and using the Malagasy locals as it suits him. Shay, however, develops feelings of kinship with the Malagasy; over the years, she becomes more and more uncomfortable with what she sees as their exploitation at the hands of wealthy Europeans. She even comes to believe that she may be on the wrong side of Madagascar's struggles with racism, classism, and colonialism--the very issues she explores as a scholar of African American literature. Bahni Turpin masterfully portrays Lee's international cast of characters, and her versatile narration pulls together the many threads of the interconnected short stories. Her warm delivery and slow pacing also allow listeners to savor Lee's lovely prose and contemplate the novel's important issues. VERDICT Listeners expecting a traditional novel may not have the patience for Lee's nonlinear narrative, but those who do will long remember the characters that Lee and Turpin have brought to life.--Beth Farrell, Cleveland State Univ. Law Lib.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

When she weds an Italian tycoon, an African American intellectual becomes the unwilling mistress of an estate in Madagascar. They meet at a wedding in Como, Italy, a case of opposites attract. "To Shay, fresh out of graduate school, Senna is a new experience: this cheeky, charismatic Italian a decade and a half older than she is, a businessman...who...has bought part of an actual island." During their courtship, Senna builds the Red House, a tropical mansion whose architectural influences range from Indonesia to Antigua to Disney World, staffing it with an army of locals and a Greek house manager, to provide a setting for an annual holiday throughout their married life. In a series of tales set over two decades, Shay has a love-hate relationship with the estate and her role there; she is "expected to pass her holiday months not as a sojourner comfortably decompressing from a busy Milan life of teaching and translating and chivying her college-bound kids, but as a vigilant matriarch who exerts iron control--even if it is part-time--over the work ethic, health, and morality of her numerous Malagasy household staff." Gorgeous writing, fascinating stories, and a vibrant cast of locals and expats dance around this basic theme. One of Shay's early allies is Bertine La Grande, the head housekeeper, who helps her use witchcraft to undo the wrongs wrought by her husband and the evil manager. Another thread depicts the rivalry between two powerful women, one a restaurateur and the other a bar owner. Against a background of myth and magic, as well as racism, sex tourism, and exploitation, the never-perfect match between Senna and Shay continues to devolve. An utterly captivating, richly detailed, and highly critical vision of how the one percent lives in neocolonial paradise. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.