{"id":54248,"date":"2017-06-22T00:28:40","date_gmt":"2017-06-22T00:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=54248"},"modified":"2017-06-22T00:28:40","modified_gmt":"2017-06-22T00:28:40","slug":"a-boy-caught-between-love-and-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=54248","title":{"rendered":"A boy caught between love and race"},"content":{"rendered":"

A boy caught between love and race<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Books<\/a>
\nThe Washington Post<\/a>
\n2017-06-15<\/p>\n

Ausma Zehanat Khan<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/a>
\nThrity Umrigar<\/a>, the author (Robert Muller)<\/small><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Thrity Umrigar, Everybody’s Son<\/a>, A Novel<\/em> (New York: HarperCollins, 2017)<\/strong><\/p>\n

The premise of Thrity Umrigar\u2019s<\/a> new novel, \u201cEverybody\u2019s Son<\/a>,\u201d is straightforward: a wealthy white family whose son has died adopts a black child from the projects. Through this disturbing yet evocative tale, Umrigar \u2014 best known for her books \u201cThe Space Between Us\u201d and \u201cThe World We Found\u201d \u2014 offers a troubling look at race and the conflicting desires of two families.<\/p>\n

At the center of the story is Anton Vesper, a little boy whose mother, Juanita, is addicted to crack<\/a>. She left Anton alone in a hot basement for days before he broke out and is rescued by the local police. Shortly thereafter, Anton meets a judge named David Coleman who happens to be struggling with the loss of his own child. In Anton, Coleman sees a charismatic child. He decides to bring Anton home, almost as a consolation prize for his grieving wife, Delores…<\/p>\n

…Though Coleman is treated sympathetically throughout the novel, he is shadowed by his corrupt morality. There is no eluding it: Coleman destroyed a woman\u2019s life by taking her child and using his wealth, power and whiteness against her. He has also robbed a child of his heritage, raising difficult questions for readers to ponder:<\/p>\n

Would Coleman have wanted Anton if he were a dark-skinned black child, if he hadn\u2019t been able to blend so effortlessly into his world? We later learn that Anton is bi-racial, perhaps explaining this. Would a black mother view blackness as a curse that a white man\u2019s wealth and status could provide compensation for?…<\/p>\n

Read the entire review here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The premise of Thrity Umrigar\u2019s new novel, \u201cEverybody\u2019s Son,\u201d is straightforward: a wealthy white family whose son has died adopts a black child from the projects. Through this disturbing yet evocative tale, Umrigar \u2014 best known for her books \u201cThe Space Between Us\u201d and \u201cThe World We Found\u201d \u2014 offers a troubling look at race and the conflicting desires of two families.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,5,20],"tags":[27142,2875,27141,2581],"class_list":["post-54248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts","category-book-reviews","category-usa","tag-ausma-zehanat-khan","tag-the-washington-post","tag-thrity-umrigar","tag-washington-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54248"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54249,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54248\/revisions\/54249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}