Mollie asked:

I have this book on the table to read. I also have UNDERGROUND and HOMEGOING. and will read them all. Question: I have to recommend a book for our 2018 book group, I wonder if any of the three would be a good choice. I am not thinking of the books but my group. We are level headed, and open but we are white. How can white women fully relate to any of the above? What can we bring to the conversation?

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8 years ago
6 answers

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Amber I am starting this one now so I can't say between all three, but have read both of the others, and I'd choose Homegoing over Underground Railroad for a group. There are two drastically different styles of storytelling (although I feel both are very important stories): Underground for the most part stays with the main character Cora throughout the story, and Homegoing transitions through characters over a long period of time. The reason I would recommend Homegoing, especially for a white audience (I am white), is because I was constantly left wanting, wondering what happened to ____ as the the story progressed. But that's the whole point though. White generations have had their stories told and endings documented, and for the most part if you want to find out your genealogy you can do so. The stories of black generations for so long went unfinished. People would literally disappear without a trace. It's profound and devastating. And what I took away from this (and Underground Railroad, and The Fire this Time, and others like it) is that as a white person I will never understand the plight of descendants of African slaves, but it makes me self-aware of my own white privilege (which in the case of Homegoing is the fact that I can trace my ancestral heritage... without a prevalence of unthinkable violence). I think in a book group you couldn't go wrong with either of the two I've read.

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Aparna Shah I am a South Asian woman, and I can definitely empathize with the characters in this book, "Hum if You Don't Know the Words". I don't think skin colour matters because the book is moving at such a human level; it touches the core.

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Becca Osborn I would definitely say this book and Homegoing would be good for book club.

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Gillian Katz YES. It is especially for white women. I am a white South African currently writing a book that is very similar to this one. As a book group with white women, you will see another culture, another time. Also how a white girl can get so close to her black nanny. I was very close to my black nannies, closer than I was to my own mother. This is a MUST READ for anyone wanting to learn about white/black cultures across the world.

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Kelly Jackson I want to thank you for being aware enough to answer this question! I am a white woman who has read Homegoing and am currently reading Hum If You Don't Know The Words. Don't expect to bring anything to the conversation, you can't, but you can listen to the conversation and you can empathize, the two most important things you can do as a white woman in regards to black women's stories.

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