Half a Heart
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Book Overview
A moving story about estrangement and intimacy, race and privilege, identity and belonging from the bestselling author of Before and After
Miriam Vener feels trapped in the comfortable white middle-class life she leads with her family in Houston during the 1980s. That life suddenly shatters with the appearance, after almost eighteen years, of Veronica (Ronnee), her biracial daughter born in Mississippi in the sixties when Miriam was a civil rights activist. Hot tempered, sensitive, manipulative and deeply hurt at her mother's disappearance from her life, Ronnee has been raised by her father, a formerly brilliant college professor who forbade her to see her white mother. Half a Heart charts the emotionally fraught terrain of the mother and daughter's reunion and Ronnee's divided sense of self and loyalty. With which family, and which race, does she identify? How does all this affect her relationships with her newly discovered half-sister, her white boyfriend, and the father she is rebelling against? Half a Heart is a searingly honest novel of public and private ideals betrayed and hopes reignited by one of our foremost novelists.Format:Paperback
Language:English
ISBN:0312278306
ISBN13:9780312278304
Release Date:May 2001
Publisher:St. Martins Press-3PL
Length:416 Pages
Weight:0.85 lbs.
Dimensions:0.9" x 5.5" x 8.5"
Customer Reviews
5 ratings
An emotionally rewarding answer to the question "what if?"
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 23 years ago
As the mother of several grown children, I've often wondered who my children would have been without my influence...who I would have been without them at the center of my life. This wonderful story explores those "What if" questions in an engrossing and authentic way. By creating a mother and daughter who are desperate to compensate for a lifetime of seperation, this book pays beautiful tribute to the amazing power of parenthood. As is always true of Ms. Brown's books, the writing is lush and lovely.
Gripping
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 24 years ago
I gulped down this book in two days. The novel deals with important issues and the charactes are full-bodied, three-dimensional, complex.
Decide for Yourself
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 24 years ago
Hard to believe I read the same book these reviewers are trashing. It's far more complex and sympathetic on all sides, not sentimental but challenging (maybe that's the problem)and unwilling to accept easy stereotypes. Ronnee is no "tragic mulatto" -- she may be confused but she's much too dignified for that. And her father is no big black brute. So what's going on here? Protecting the turf,to keep white writers from poaching on territory that isn't "theirs"? I guess readers will have to decide for themselves but they should read "Half a Heart" and make up their own minds.
fragile bonds
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 24 years ago
This is a beautiful novel that gives us a complex look at the way families can divide over race. Brown never allows us to take sides, as she keeps showing us how the terms of the racial debate are flawed from the start. A brave work by a gifted storyteller.
Whole Hearted Praise for "Half A Heart"
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 24 years ago
Rosellen Brown has created very real and all-too human characters in this vivid book. Miriam and Ronnee's struggles to accept themselves, to accept one another, and to accept the past are powerful and painful. The complex issues of race, motherhood (and daughterhood), class, and honesty are addressed beautifully, with powerful prose and visceral descriptions. Brown enters the heads of both characters with equal strength and emotional intuition. Highly recommended!
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