A review by mochagirl
The Professor's Daughter by Emily Raboteau
5.0
he Professor's Daughter is Emma Boudreaux, a young woman who is struggling with the loss of her older "spiritual twin" brother, Bernie (Bernard Boudreaux III), who dies after a brief coma following a freak accident. Emma has long been a victim of physical and emotional abandonment from her father, the world renowned Yale professor, Bernard Boudreaux II, but her brother's death seems to exacerbate her "condition" and pushes her over the edge.
Emma's "condition" is that of self-doubt originally stemming from her ethnicity (her father is African American, her mother Caucasian) and the struggles of trying to fit into a world that is largely black or white. She leans heavily on her brother as her strength during the early childhood years when she is taunted by other children. She becomes somewhat of a recluse, excelling academically while learning to "disappear" or become "invisible" in order to avoid the negative attention her physical appearance seems to attract. But this is not merely a tale of the tragic mulatto - it goes deeper - and Raboteau's beckoning style sets the tone perfectly.
There's an expression, "the fruit does not fall far from the tree," and although Emma was somewhat of an enigma, I found the professor's character more intriguing and complex. Within him lies inner struggles and conflict that were seemingly inherited by his son with residual turmoil passed to Emma. The professor is a brilliant man with violent and poor roots originating in the Mississippi Delta. He is very secretive and guarded about his family history. It is in his recollections that we learn he was orphaned at an early age by a traumatic event that led his mother to madness and his father to an untimely death. His journey from the poor house to the white tower is fraught with discrimination, abuse, humiliation, and loneliness. He blocks the memories of his painful childhood with disastrous results - his unresolved issues affect his life and children in a most profound manner.
The novel is partly narrated by Emma recapping her life in a series of recollections. She reminisces about past lovers, her childhood, her college years, her self-imposed sabbatical to Brazil - complete with all the drama, longing, misery, and heartbreak that come with searching for oneself and trying to uncover the "mystery" behind her grandfather's (Bernard I) passing. Raboteau takes interesting tangents along the way - cleverly supplementing the novel with Ethiopian and Sioux folklore that makes the story even more enchanting in an unconventional kind of way. I will admit that this novel is not for everyone; however, I enjoyed it from its opening passages. I found it to be perfectly paced and very well written.
Emma's "condition" is that of self-doubt originally stemming from her ethnicity (her father is African American, her mother Caucasian) and the struggles of trying to fit into a world that is largely black or white. She leans heavily on her brother as her strength during the early childhood years when she is taunted by other children. She becomes somewhat of a recluse, excelling academically while learning to "disappear" or become "invisible" in order to avoid the negative attention her physical appearance seems to attract. But this is not merely a tale of the tragic mulatto - it goes deeper - and Raboteau's beckoning style sets the tone perfectly.
There's an expression, "the fruit does not fall far from the tree," and although Emma was somewhat of an enigma, I found the professor's character more intriguing and complex. Within him lies inner struggles and conflict that were seemingly inherited by his son with residual turmoil passed to Emma. The professor is a brilliant man with violent and poor roots originating in the Mississippi Delta. He is very secretive and guarded about his family history. It is in his recollections that we learn he was orphaned at an early age by a traumatic event that led his mother to madness and his father to an untimely death. His journey from the poor house to the white tower is fraught with discrimination, abuse, humiliation, and loneliness. He blocks the memories of his painful childhood with disastrous results - his unresolved issues affect his life and children in a most profound manner.
The novel is partly narrated by Emma recapping her life in a series of recollections. She reminisces about past lovers, her childhood, her college years, her self-imposed sabbatical to Brazil - complete with all the drama, longing, misery, and heartbreak that come with searching for oneself and trying to uncover the "mystery" behind her grandfather's (Bernard I) passing. Raboteau takes interesting tangents along the way - cleverly supplementing the novel with Ethiopian and Sioux folklore that makes the story even more enchanting in an unconventional kind of way. I will admit that this novel is not for everyone; however, I enjoyed it from its opening passages. I found it to be perfectly paced and very well written.