Cane River is an odd mix of fiction and non-fiction, and I'm not sure it entirely works. It feels like trying to find the balance between the two constrains the narrative in ways that either one by itself would not. As non-fiction, it is limited by the availability of sources, and it truly seems like there is much that has to be speculative. As fiction, it is equally limited by the sources - the author is hemmed in by what she does know, and that structure seems binding.

Note: The rest of this review has been withheld due to the recent changes in Goodreads policy and enforcement. You can read why I came to this decision here.

In the meantime, you can read the entire review at Smorgasbook

This book will make you appreciate much of which we take for granted everyday. The narrative is told so well- through numerous viewpoints.

I liked this book about a world that is foreign to me but so interesting - the deep South just prior to just after the Civil War. Based on facts the author discovered about her family and wove into a novel, this book deals with distinctions based on race and traces several generations of strong women from slavery through freedom. I like novels that trace generations and ones that are people-centered - this one fits the bill.

Amazing...

"Cane River" is a family saga of 4+ generations of African American women from slavery to the 1930s. The writing is straightforward, even simple; not great. I found it hard to engage at first, but the narrative eventually becomes engrossing. This is actually a fictionalized family history -- real people, real dates, real events but re-imagined with dialog and inner thoughts of the characters. That gives it a resonance that is deeper than the writing. As I said, it's about the women. The only men of significance are the white men who bed but cannot wed (even though some of them want to) the women. Over generations, members of the family have lighter and lighter skin and some pass for white. Almost totally absent: black men. This is not an oversight by the author; she's telling us the story as it was. The absence of the black men was part of the culture of slavery and its legacy. The black husbands and wives (or lovers) in "Cane River" are consistently and intentionally separated, leaving the women dependent on their white masters and lovers (who are depicted relatively sympathetically). This helps explain the chronic weakness of black families--or rather the absence of men. Actually, the families are strong matriarchies.

From the author: “Cane River covers 137 years of my family’s history, written as fiction, but deeply rooted in years of research, historical fact, and family lore.”

I love me a generational historical fiction!! Ms.Tademy did that! Very well written, especially for a debut novel. She was dedicated to telling her family history. I loved that she made it historical fiction in order to fill in the blanks and tell a complete story. In doing so she brought these real people to life and had my heart invested in this family.

“There were gaps I filled in based on research of the events and mood of the place and time. I presupposed motivations. Occasionally I changed a name, date, or circumstance to accommodate narrative flow. I tried to capture the essence of truth, if not always the precision of fact, and trust that the liberties I have taken will be forgiven.”

It was clear how Ms.Tamedy’s story and dedication to her research inspired The Love Songs of W.E.B DuBois. Cane River would be the one I would recommend. This one was more palatable as it wasn’t overly graphic. Of course we know certain things happened, but we were spared the heartbreaking details and I was very appreciative of that.

An enjoyable read. Not a full 5, as it didn’t take me where Homegoing did (that book has my heart forever

Lolita Tademy gave up a successful career to concentrate on writing this absorbing, informative and moving book, which looks at four female generations of her family, women who were born into slavery in Louisiana.
It wasn't an easy read....books about the evil inhumanity of slavery are never easy to read....I felt angry many times, not only about how those sold into slavery were treated, but also at the unfairnesses shown to these men and women after emancipation....I fail to understand how otherwise decent people could behave in this way.
I've read quite a few books set in this era, each with a different perspective, this book gives a very personal view of those times, as we see it through the eyes of real people, and the author's use of original family documents and photographs really did give substance to the story she wove around the lives and experiences of her ancestors.

I picked up this book after I read the author's story in Chicken Soup. I admire her, having taken that leap of faith, deciding to leave her top corporate job, just so she can concentrate on her mission to find out about her family, her roots. She herself admitted that she didn't really know what compelled her to resign; and she didn't have any idea then where that decision would take her. Well, it took her to a two-year long discovery of he lineage, and eventually to a bestseller.

The author, Lalita, is of the seventh generation down from Elizabeth in a mixed-race family who went through the tough times of slavery and discrimination from as early as the 17th century. It demonstrates the strength of women, so evident nowadays, but it had been so even before. They may have been looked down upon, but they bore the weight of the hard times and made sure that their children were raised right under whatever circumstances.

A good story to draw strength upon.

A wonderful family saga to sink your teeth into over the holiday break, Cane River takes place in Creole French Louisiana and tells the story of 4 generations of women who enduredthe indignities of slavery as well as racial discrimination for many years after "freedom." You will fall in love with these characters, their strengths, weaknesses, heartbreaks, and triumphs. I will forever be haunted by the powerful matriarch, Philomene, her glimpsings, and her ability to take care of business for herself and her children and grandchildren. This is a story that needed to be told, and Lalita Tademy did a beautiful job doing so here in this fictional retelling of her family history that pays tribute her ancestors who came before her. These women are inspirational, from strong stock, but the world is unkind to them nonetheless. How they found the strength to continue to fight is a kind of miracle. I hope those who get emotionally invested in these characters' stories can shoulder at least some of the responsibility of never letting these injustices against human dignity happen again. I especially love that Tademy quit her corporate job to write her family's story. How very important, especially since so many descended from slaves could not trace their roots as far back as she does here. What a gift! Tademy is as fearless and inspirational as the women who came before her, and she has honored them beautifully in these pages. I highly recommend Cane River.

**note: scroll far, far down for the meme summaries

"When the census taker looked at them, he saw colored first, asking questions like single or married, trying to introduce shame where there was none. He took what he saw and foolishly put those things down on a list for others to study. Could he even understand the pride in being able to say that Emily could read and write? They could ask whatever they wanted, but what he should have been marking in the book was family, and landholder, and educated, each generation gathering momentum, adding something special to the brew."

This is truly a 4.5-star review, as Cane River is a touching combination of familial research, incomplete records, and the reimagined lives of Lalita Tademy’s ancestors in the eponymous section of Louisiana. Recently, I've been learning about how researching your genealogy is a form of ancestral work, one that is made infinitely harder by the unfeeling historical documents one finds in a county or parish's records. Through a slightly fictionalized account, Tademy colors in what the Census and slave records left out from the story of her great-grandmothers, four of whom were born into and lived out of slavery.

I am in love with the way she intersperses Elisabeth, Suzette, Philomene, and Emily's narratives with family photos, personal letters, historical versions of data I use every day (like the Census), and also "property records" of enslaved people. I was struck by the tonal similarity of the 1850 plantation bill of sale and the 1880 Census--if not for Tademy's work in between the documents, it would be hard to see any different treatment of the subjects captured in each report. I am struggling against this technocratic orientation towards public records in my own professional work, and it was touching to see how Tademy uses her own family's stories to provide a "people-first" context for this data. In one of Emily's sections, she remarks that certain people in the Cane River society “saw him from the outside and offered up one piece of the man at a time, like it was the whole cloth. He was more than that.” With this work, Lalita Tademy helps weave the whole cloth of her family, and I am incredibly grateful for it.

In addition to the genealogical work in this novel, Cane River is also an amazingly crafted story: Tademy gracefully takes us from Antebellum to near present day, summarizing trends of the changing Louisiana landscape and expansion of the family tree with a measured cadence that mirrors the passing of time. Each new section begins with a preview of the family tree to come, and asks us to unravel what Elisabeth later calls "a conscious and not-so-conscious bleaching of the line." Each time I saw Eugene Daurant, Narcisse Fredieu, or even Joseph Billes lurking around Cane River, I became both upset and incensed by the sexual manipulation and abuse we know will follow them (Lalita Tademy lays out this crushing cycle all too well.) In the later sections, Tademy explores the growing irony in the Jackson-DeNegre-Daurant-Fredieu-Billes clan's ideological separation from the white people in their parish and their family, even as they try to become closer to whiteness.

On that point: it's interesting to see how various women in this story internalized that colorism over the years, and how it led to lost relationships and love for many offspring. At first I judged the characters, but that probably wasn’t fair to people trying to do the best in the worst of circumstances, and probably doesn’t recognize similar histories in my own family. While I can’t relate to having family who tried to paper bag test any potential romantic partners, I’ve definitely heard stories of how my dad was his grandmother’s favorite at least in part because of his light skin. There is also a class dynamic I recognized, as Suzette and Emily wanted their kids to “strengthen the blood of [their] own children” in order to “give the children a better chance.” In later years, Elisabeth and Philomene recognize that their relations with white men didn’t necessarily guarantee their biracial children better lives than their half-siblings, who were the products of consensual, loving relationships between enslaved people. However, many mothers today are still struggling to learn this lesson—that someone’s skin color or bank account doesn’t determine whether they will be a good parent or partner. Due to the libidinal and capitalist economies we live under, parents' skin and wealth surely provides significant opportunities for their offspring, but this is not the same as security or even contentment.

I will be thinking about this book for a long time to come, and think it's a masterful guide for those of us attempting to "fill the dashes" in our family tree.

****Meme corner***
In 2021, I am trying to summarize my books in written and visual format, so here goes a rough try:

Meme 1: whenever the white characters try to tell the women what a good life they've had in the big house

Meme 2: live footage of Elisabeth on her deathbed and T.O. choosing a wife

I am always wary when it comes to books written by regular people who decided to discover their family history. They more often than not are of interest only to the authors and their relatives. And they are usually badly written.
Also this was an "Oprah" book, so I was expecting lots of gooey 'women power' yadda-yadda.

I was pleasantly surprised. Wheares Ms Tademy might not win Nobel Prize for literature anytime soon I don't feel I have wasted my time. She doesn't over-romantacise her heroines - something hard to avoid when you write about your ancestors, so she earned one star for that alone. The remaining three stars are for an interesting story and insight into life in Deep South during the slavery and post-Civil War era. The book seems extremely well researched so I trust my vision of that time is not distorted.

This was a pick for my face to face book club. I generally either love or hate Oprah's picks. Upon reading the synopsis, I thought this might be really interesting, but unfortunately, it never got off the ground for me. The author is writing about 4 generations of her family who started out as slaves in the Cane River area of Louisiana. While there was some interesting explanations about the hierarchy of the people in that area (free people of color, mulattos, Creoles, etc), the characterization a of the main characters fell flat for me (a sentiment shared by other bookclub member).

Under full disclosure, I did mostly skim the last sections of the book since book club so that I "finished" before my bookclub meeting.