Alexander’s review of You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty > Likes and Comments

Thank you. My TBR also thanks you. :)

Alexander, are you a Black woman? If you were I think you’d understand the importance of having it written explicitly on page how beautiful Black characters are.

Fantastic review, Alexander. I'll forget the book but not the review.

Good review. This is also my first book by this author. I’m debating whether to finish the book or not. I agree with your review.

Amazing review! Life is too short. Thank you!

Tori wrote: "Alexander, are you a Black woman? If you were I think you’d understand the importance of having it written explicitly on page how beautiful Black characters are."

Hey Tori, sorry for the late response - sometimes Goodreads is terrible at giving notifications, I only saw your comment by chance.

I am not a Black woman, I am a white guy. And it's a valid point you make, our white-dominated society does push down on the idea that poc are beautiful, or even can be beautiful, so I see how that hearing/reading you are beautiful is important.

But there's another layer there, one that maybe overlaps with your point - the privilige of being beautiful. When I read the book, it was made pretty clear at the start how stunningly beautiful these people are, and I have no reason to doubt that (although I would've liked the beauty to have been described better, but that's a small quibble.). And then they kept saying to eachother how stunningly beautiful they were, to me not so much out of wanting to have reassurance, but more out of reaffirming their place on top of the hierarchy of beauty.

Our whole society is geared towards beauty (and youth, they're intertwined), a hierarchy of the beautiful people over the murky, mundane rest of us. I've grown up ashamed of my body, forever unsure about how I look. And then there's the people who can spend their summer fucking around with whoever they fancy - because their beauty gives them confidence, their beauty is power.

It doesn't help that it feels like Feyi as a character is so confident she feels she can screw over other people's lives because she feels she deserves whatever she wants. She doesn't seem to care much about consequence. To me, that is connected with the power that her beauty gives her.

So yeah, I totally acknowledge that our society wrongly tells Black people (and Black women especially) that they are not beautiful, and even worse, don't deserve to be. That is disgusting, it is wrong. But to me, there is much more to being beautiful regarding power dynamics.

Thanks Alexander for this review, and thanks Tori for initiating a good chat discussion! I wanted to chime in because my problem with the "Black characters deserve to be explicitly depicted as beautiful" argument is that it doesn't apply to what Akwaeke Emezi does in this book. Fool of Death doesn't praise all (or even most!) of its Black characters' beauty, and it fails to subvert any societally-accepted norms of beauty.* Instead, it rationalizes Feyi's use of desirability to manipulate other Black characters.

So, in this essay I will (LMAO) use a few examples from the text to prove how it's dishonest to say that most critiques of Fool of Death have a problem with reading about beautiful Black characters. Most of the critiques I've seen are about the moral depravity of just two Black characters, Feyi and Alim. These characters (which I like to call the villainous couple) are obnoxiously, incessantly, and uncreatively extolled as "beautiful" in this book, while they go about wreaking emotional havoc on every other Black person in this story.

If we look to the text, Akwaeke Emezi makes their perspective on their protagonist's beauty plain from page 2:

"It would have been a corny line if she wasn't so beautiful, and Feyi knew it—how to part her lips in their full wine red, how to look up at him from under thick black lashes, how to inject a lifetime of suggestion into her voice. It was all a game, a simple formula, and there was nothing wrong with using these cards she'd been dealt."

To me, that's not a book affirming the beauty of Black characters or people. That's a book describing how one normatively beautiful Black woman uses that beauty to gain advantages. These advantages are not accessible to Black people who aren't conventionally attractive, and that's a slippery slope. How, you ask? In many places, this book rationalizes Feyi's indulgent, inconsiderate behavior by saying "she deserves to enjoy life [by being an asshole]." When you combine this with the uncritical praise of her desirability, it's hard not to reach the conclusion that she at least partially "deserves" to be an asshole because she is—you guessed it—beautiful. That is by no means an affirming message for anyone who doesn't look like Feyi or Akwaeke, for that matter. (I'm trying to keep this post to the characters' actions and ideologies, but of course there is a whole other discussion about the way desirability impacts how people engage with Akwaeke Emezi's work, online persona, and purported brilliance.)

In fact, Feyi's ideas of what she deserves because of her beauty harm at least two other Black women: Lorraine and Joy. With Lorraine, it's a bit more straightforward, so I want to specifically dive into the latter dynamic. Given my experience being the 'lesbian friend' of Black women who primarily date cishet men, and seeing my other queer friends go through the same issues, I immediately perked up during the discussion of Feyi and Joy's sexual history on pages 58-59. Let's just say that it's not at all uncommon for women who primarily pursue relationships with cishet men to "play around" with their lesbian friends, particularly in ways that are not reciprocal (when Joy says Feyi was a pillow princess, I 110% believe her.) It's also telling that Feyi is offended when Lorraine mentions she's not interested in her. You can play it off the first time, but after Feyi harps on this topic again with Alim on page 118, it's clear that she's joking-not-joking. This is a subtle type of homophobia where someone doesn't actually want to have a reciprocal sexual relationship (in Feyi's case) or a serious romantic relationship (in numerous IRL cases) with a woman or non-binary person, but is nonetheless offended that said person, as a lesbian, isn't head over heels in love with them. This phenomenon is a big part of why many lesbians I know distinguish cis women who are bisexual and heteroromantic from those are bisexual and biromantic. (Basically, the former group is much more likely to waste your time and not treat you like a full person.) This whole thing is tied to societal hierarchies that value heteroromantic women as more desirable than their lesbian counterparts, especially cis heteroromantic women who are conventionally attractive, and typically only pursue serious relationships with men. This is seen in cishet men's fetishization of bisexuality, in "unicorn hunting" couples' objectification of their "third" partners, and in some lesbians' preferences for straight women—there's a lot of internalized stuff in there about notions of purity, masculinity, and of course, desire. When we live in a world with this type of value system, of course Feyi is shocked that Joy wouldn't be interested in dealing with her romantically—everything in our culture says that Feyi should be "a catch" for someone like Joy.

My final example comes from my experience as a (critical) urban planner: in Fool of Death, the concept of beauty overlaps with geographies of oppression. Emezi provides no interrogation of neocolonialism, despite setting more than half their story in a massive island mansion. The ingredients Alim lays out in his "opulent" (Akwaeke's favorite word) brunch spreads get more description than the staff who maintain this villa for Alim and his tourist guests. Readers are only left to wonder about the wages, living conditions, and "beauty" of these Black characters. In this way, Emezi's description is so similar to the lesbian "expats" in Bali who talked about how they "deserved" to be tourists in Bali because of their oppression as Black women in America. I discussed my problems with this argument at length in in my review of Jamaica Kincaid's fantastic essay, A Small Place. To paraphrase that review, the Bali couple had a similar notion of them "deserving" luxuries that other Black women in America and tourism-racked countries cannot access, and had no analysis of how their beauty plays a role in this disparity.

There's also an argument for how beauty connects to oppression in Emezi's Brooklyn. Feyi (who comes from an upper-middle class background with two professor parents) and Nasir are certainly gentrifiers in historically Black working-class neighborhoods, and I'd imagine that Joy and Milan have a similar role in the area. To understand this, we can turn to Dr. Brandi Thompson Summers' analysis of the H Street corridor in Washington, D.C. (my review of her book is here.) Thompson Summers describes how the modern gentrification process often markets an "official neighborhood history" to make places seem more culturally authentic. In the case of H Street, this is a revisionist official history that uplifts certain Black people as the "rightful" residents of a place, in both the past and future. These placemaking processes create “approachable histories” of respectable, exceptional, and dare I say "beautiful" Black people. In this case, the "beautiful people" are the ones who can afford to build and maintain bespoke homes, attain prestigious degrees or careers, and publicly behave in a way that aligns with societal norms. What goes unspoken in this real-life scenario, as well as in this book, is how the "beauty" of these elite Black characters can be weaponized against the numerous Black characters we don't hear from in this book: the working-class residents of the island, or the many longtime residents of Brooklyn who are facing displacement. In fact, all we see is a throwaway mention of Baba Yusuf, the nice dialogue-less man who stocks Feyi's kombucha at the corner store, and a random catcaller who—you guessed it—thinks Feyi looks beautiful in her workout clothes. To capital and the real estate state, these nameless Black characters are the less desirable, and thus disposable, residents of Brooklyn and the Caribbean. Emezi's uncritical use of beauty in Fool of Death does nothing to counter their disposability.

To wrap this up, I think we have to address that beauty, even for Black people, doesn't function in morally neutral ways. It's a privileged status that can support oppression.** So, I think it's very fair to criticize characters who use beauty in manipulative ways, and Akwaeke Emezi can't avoid that critique by saying "you're critiquing my book because you don't think Black people deserve to feel beautiful." In many ways, the central message of Fool of Death is that ONLY conventionally attractive, well-off, and desirable Black people deserve to feel beautiful. And like Alexander said, this exclusionary use of beauty is what most readers have a problem with.

Post-Note: I want to end with some reading suggestions, which could also double as my works cited. If people are looking for some articles, Da'Shaun L. Harrison put together a great reading list on fat studies and desirability politics on their website. Their book, Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness, also does a great job at linking both anti-fatness and desirability politics to their origins in anti-Blackness. Nicole Dennis-Benn's Here Comes the Sun is an island story that actually centers queer/lesbian romance, and doesn't ignore the ways that the construction of lavish island dwellings for the wealthy comes hand-in-hand with the displacement of working-class residents. And finally, like I've noted above, please read A Small Place and Black in Place: The Spatial Aesthetics of Race in a Post-Chocolate City!

*Yes, I'm including Alim in this discussion of societally-accepted beauty norms. A Prince-esque character who uses a splash of femme presentation is nothing new under the sun. In 2022, this has actually become the societally-accepted way for cishet men to "challenge toxic masculinity"—through aesthetics, and not tangible actions.

**I wanted to link to this really helpful Twitter thread about beauty and moral bankruptcy, but apparently I can't link to external sites in Goodreads comments. So, I'm linking my Fool of Death review instead, because I was able to link the thread there (sorry for such complexity!)

Thanks for your essay (ha), Gabriella, that was really interesting. I think that "In many ways, the central message of their book is that ONLY conventionally attractive, well-off, and desirable Black people deserve to feel beautiful." hits at the heart of our critique, and this same idea is one that white conventionally beautiful people use, and it's sad to see non-white people co-opting it, because it's just another brand of opression.

It's a lot of words to spend on what is supposed to be a romance, supposedly just a nice fantasy, I suppose, but Emezi themselves makes the book (a bit) political, by misconstrueing the criticism the book receives. Their idea of a 'Hot Girl Summer' becomes an opressive, exclusionary thing, sadly.

Alexander, pretend this never happened and read Freshwater. You won’t be sorry. It’s as if they were written by different people.

Great review and comment discussion. Lots of food for thought.

Thank you for this review. I just saw the author being interviewed on , 'The Daily Show', with Terva Noah. He gushed over the book encouraging for people to check it out.

It doesn't sound like my cup of tea and your review helped to confirm it. Glad I didn't waste my money on buying it. I'll put it towards gas and groceries instead 😉

Yeah, I saw a bit of the interview, Noah was really blowing smoke up their backside.

He did and it looked like he might've been flirting with the author. 🤔

Great review, Alexander. I guess I'll skip this one haha. I also found out about Emezi through the Daily Show interview

Excellent essay, Gabriella! I appreciate how detailed your post is. Thank you

Great review! I was so disappointed in this book. Emezi's first two adult novels were easy five stars from me, but this was very much NOT.

Thanks, Nadine.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Genuinely curious if you’ve experienced deep personal grief before? Because that’s what made the book so beautiful for me

Michelle wrote: "Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Genuinely curious if you’ve experienced deep personal grief before? Because that’s what made the book so beautiful for me"

Hey Michelle - yes, I have. On that point the book rings very hollow to me, filled with platitudes. Especially the idea that only another person who has known the same kind of grief could understand the main character feels borderline toxic to me. Basically building a relationship on that shared experience makes every alarm bell in my head and heart ring.

It also feels like the main character uses her grief as an excuse for doing whatever she feels like and so to hurt other people, and it's presented as if it's okay to do that. It's such a vapid way to handle grief.

Finally, for someone who supposedly can't let Jonah go, we learn almost nothing about him, or about their relationship. You'd think we'd get to know him a bit, but no, her grief is basically handled like a personality quirk, much like her being an artist is. It's a shorthand for depth, without actually going deep.

Alexander wrote: "It also feels like the main character uses her grief as an excuse for doing whatever she feels like and so to hurt other people, and it's presented as if it's okay to do that. It's such a vapid way to handle grief. ..."


That was my take on this book. I'd venture to say this was the central theme. And this is why I did not enjoy my reading experience.

Thank you Alexander and Gabriella. I loved all other books I read by Emezi, but I struggled finishing this one.

Ooh this breaks my heart because most reviews I’ve seen regarding this book are the same. It’s like when you’ve read their other work this pales so I’ve continuously heard! Thanks for this review, Alexander!

Alexander,
It looks like you're an outlier on this one. . . which only makes me more curious to read it now, given how often I'm the outlier! Nice review.

I don't know black culture but I know betrayal and I just thought the two main characters were so full of themselves while they burned through men and women and hurt people all around them. Too much entitlement for me...it I am grief stricken therefore I get to hurt people..

This review is SPOT ON.

What an interesting discussion and comments! Thank you Gabriella and Alexander.

Exactly!!

😂😂😂😂

My thoughts exactly! Many times Feyi briefly considered others’ feelings, but dismissed them because “I’m me. And I’m alive.” I understood her need to live life after trauma, but that doesn’t mean disregarding that other people are also alive & deserving of compassion and respect.

This is such a helpful review and discussion. I've been feeling like I've been missing something cos I really really disliked this book were other readers I usually chime with praised it to the skies. Loved that you called it 'icky' - it just so gave me the ick.

I couldn't agree more, I'm not sure if this book even qualifies as romance there was no love interest as far as I can tell just many, many, MANY random men. And I absolutely hated the mc she basically played all these men and the author excused it by claiming it was due to her trauma

Susie wrote: "Alexander, pretend this never happened and read Freshwater. You won’t be sorry. It’s as if they were written by different people."

I second this. Freshwater was a great book. Which made me even more dissapointed with Ekmezis´s newest one.

Most accurate book review ever..THANK YOUUUUU!

i have read two books by emezi — death of vivek oji and freshwater and rated them 5 and 4 stars respectively. i can’t believe they are the same author of this book! don’t give up on their other books though 😭

the perfect review

Cringeworthy is right. Every time he called her “sweetness”I puked. Which came out to about 983 times overall.

You have to read freshwater ✨

“She barely has a personality, just the trauma” - haha! brilliantly put! 🫠

this is such a harsh and disappointing critique of a beautiful book written by a beautiful person. Other commenters were tactful in their responses to you, but I have no such tact. Your ease at bashing Emezi and their characters and book under the pretense of "pretty privilege" is so classic pick me white man, and this is coming from another white man, just so you don't get so quickly defensive. Your eloquence on privilege doesn't denote yours yand the effect it has on your perspective. Perhaps if books with real life problems, dialogue, and characters rub you so raw, you should stick to Austen and Dickens.

I’m reading it so far and I feel the same. I’m disappointed in the book, literally from the first few chapters.

Jamsey wrote: "this is such a harsh and disappointing critique of a beautiful book written by a beautiful person. Other commenters were tactful in their responses to you, but I have no such tact. Your ease at bas..."

"real life problems", ha ha. That's hilarious.

Sigourney wrote: "I’m reading it so far and I feel the same. I’m disappointed in the book, literally from the first few chapters."

Sadly, it doesn't get any better..

I just finished the book. I only read reviews once I’m done. Glad I didn’t bc I’d not of read this book based on your review but omg, hahaha - best review, on point and funny 👌🏼

Real 😭😭😭

Amazingly said. So true. It went from bad to worse

From the first line of the book I need I was in for a treat.I like that Feyi finally found herself but the events that led to that was dire and utterly heartbreaking

Thank God I didn't let your review stop me from reading it because now I 100% recommend it. It's cliché, it's unrealistic, so? Who tf wants realism in the world we're currently living in?
And the problematic relationship? Newsflash: these relationships exist, and they can be everything a regular relationship is.

So, good on you for over-analyzing a fictional novel, I'm gonna let myself have a little escape from reality with it✨️

normally i give a book sixty pages but after six and reading your review i'm out of here.

Totally agree… I DNF’d the book once I realize where the story was going…. I fucking hated Feyi even in the few chapters I read but year the whole plot was upgrading from one fuckbuddy to the next..🤮🤢

Huh. Wonder if you'd say the same thing if the narrator was a man...