Joy
-
- $109.00
-
- $109.00
Descripción editorial
“All families got secrets, but Joy’s had more than their fair share. So while I’m able to tell you what she did, ain’t no use me pretending that I know why … they was just born under bad moons.”
This is the story of Joy Bang and her sisters, three singers who dream of a glittering future that briefly, too briefly is theirs. When Joy dies unexpectedly, the floodgates of Baby Palatine’s memory are opened. Foster mother to the sisters from their childhood, she remembers the hopes and dreams which fuelled their meteoric rise. But as the family gathers for the funeral, Baby is forced to acknowledge that as well as the Joy she loved and worshipped, there was another Joy she had never known …
A compelling story of jealousy and love, tragedy and deception, and of growing up black in a white world, this is Marsha Hunt’s powerful first novel.
About the author
Marsha Hunt was born in 1946 and grew up in Philadelphia. She studied at the University of California in Berkeley during the student riots of the 1960s but soon left for Europe.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The namesake of Hunt's appealing but uneven first novel is a black woman who, with her two sisters, rises from poverty in Oakland, Calif., to find brief fame in an all-girl, Supremes-like singing group. Joy has just died when the book opens, and her life story is recounted in the feisty voice of the elderly Baby Palatine, who has adoringly cared for Joy since childhood. But as the family gathers--somewhat grudgingly--for Joy's funeral, they set about destroying Baby Palatine's image of her ``God-sent'' former charge with insinuations of racial self-hatred, steamy sex, blackmail and even murder. Hunt, born in Philadelphia and now an actress in London and the mother of Mick Jagger's first child, demonstrates considerable talent in tackling the eventful career of such a complex character. Yet she still has much to master in her craft: her grasp of African-American vernacular is engaging but uneven, and the swarming plot seems a cross between Rebecca and Dreamgirls , with a final scene of carnage appropriate for a Die Hard sequel.
