Black Dance
A Novel
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
A dying screenwriter conjures a fascinating past in a novel “as musical as a Bach prelude” from the Prix Femina-winning author of Fault Lines (Elle, France).
Renowned screenwriter Milo Noirlac is dying. As he lies in his hospital bed, voices from his past and present come to him, each taking on the rhythm of his favorite Brazilian fight-dance, the capoeira. Seated next to him is Milo’s director, co-writer, and lover Paul Schwartz, who coaxes Milo through the complex tale that will be their final masterpiece—his life story.
From the abuse Milo suffered as a foster child, to the loss of his beloved grandfather’s priceless library, his imagination brings to life several generations of ancestors: voices in French and English, German and Dutch, Cree and Gaelic. There’s his Irish grandfather, a would-be poet, classmate of “Jimmy” Joyce, and agitator against British occupation; Awinita, Milo’s biological mother, an Indian teen prostitute; Eugénio, a Brazilian street child whom Milo finds and fosters. As each voice cascades through Milo’s memory, a fragment of history—both personal and global—falls into place.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A scathing story that examines the terror and loss of identity, Huston's (Fault Lines) vivisection of the human condition is both philosophically rich and emotionally satisfying. Dying screenwriter Milo Noirlac tells his life story to his film director lover, Paul, revealing Milo's heritage through his recollections of his ancestors' lives and stories. From Indian prostitute Awinita, Milo's addict mother, to disillusioned Irish poet Neil Kerrigan, his grandfather, memories trace the impulsive decisions that resulted in Milo's failed marriage and bouts of depression. In the "Gingare," the dance of life, Milo finds both liberation and tragedy, and, in the last stage of his life, finally accepts his fate. Empathy and sardonic humor charge this self-reflective life story, as does the the relationship between life and art; and Huston's cast of characters, rendered through Milo's imaginings, vividly blur the lines of his fading perception: "All the voices have been yours since the beginning. They've always been your consolation and salvation." Resisting simplistic clarification, Huston depicts a complicated life full of shortcomings and triumphs, and ultimately shows art's freeing power to let loose secrets locked by the conscious mind.
