O.K., I've thought about Black Girl/White Girl for a few days now. On the down side, I did not like anybody in this book. Genna was so spineless, her father was detestable, likewise her mother and Minette - aaargh! Minette was one of those people who, even though I knew that the things done to her were reprehensible, I could not help thinking that she brought on some of it herself. I'm not talking about the harassment, but she was just so unlikeable, self-involved and superior and she seemed to revel in her annoying qualities that it was easy to see why no one liked her and nobody outside of Genna, wanted to be her friend. I just wanted her to go away. And Genna was even worse. After a while I wanted to slap her. Get over it. Minette is not likeable and you do not have to spend so much time trying to like her or making excuses for her. Sure, having to fraternize with unpleasant people can't be helped some of the time, but beyond trying to make the best of it, time spent trying to convince yourself that you have to make a friend out of someone, when they've done nothing to merit the effort, is time wasted. On the other hand, in Genna's defense, she was raised with a giant helping of liberal left/guilt thinking, forcefed to her by her parents (her father especially), so she was, to some degree, unable to keep herself from acting as she did. It's hard to know yourself - to know what you think and feel - when raised by such people. And I'm not talking about liberal 60's parents only. I was raised by a 60's conservative parent of the same stripe, personality-wise, and it was some time before I was able to think for myself.
So - although I did not like the people, the time-period or much of the story, I still think this was a good book, if for no other reason than that I have continued to think about it since I finished it. For that I give it three and a half stars. I don't think that I will be reading Oates again for a while just yet. Maybe when I feel myself getting too happy I might try her again just to keep everything in balance. But for now - not so much. ( )

there isn't enough room for my entire review here..so i will direct you to my blog:

http://jayditreader.blogspot.com

for the complete review....thank you ( )

Well, first off, this is NOT a book about race--despite what the title leads you to believe. This is a book about dysfunctional families, and the politics and atmosphere of the Vietnam and post-Vietnam era. The story of two girls (one black, one white) share a room during freshman year in college is merely the framework for the story of the white girl's family (mostly her father).

I can't say that this framework was a good one for telling this story, but I can say that the writing and story was engaging and held me to the very end. It did keep me guessing.

I sympathized with a few of the characters, but didn't like any of them. That made it hard for me hard to rate the book very high.

This was my first Joyce Carol Oates. I think I enjoyed it enough to check out others. If anybody has any suggestions as to what the next should be, please forward them on. ( )

This book, set in 1974, handles the issue of race in our country in an unusual way. We find out early on that Genna Hewett-Meade's black college roommate, Minette Swift, dies under mysterious circumstances and then Oates unravels the details of Genna life and her relationship with Minette. Genna was raised by liberal social anarchists of the sixties who instill in her a fascination with black culture. However, Minette has personality issues of her own that are overlooked simply because of her race. An interesting look at issues of race in the 1970s that remain relevant today. ( )

An absolutely engaging look into the relationship between two young girls away from home for the first time.

Genna is almost painfully earnest in her attempts to befriend her Black roommate. The daughter of a notorious civil rights activist, she specifically requested to be in an "interracial" living situation and frequently daydreamed about the amazing friendship she would develop with her soon-to-be Black roommate.

Minette, however, is quite different than the woman Genna imagined. Unlike the "other" Black girls attending this all-women college in the 1970s, Minette is completely indifferent to her roommate and to her classmates. She is distinctly drawn by Oates -- a well-known mysterious figure on campus, who is always recognized, but still always apart.

As Minette unravels throughout the school year, Gemma continues to do whatever she can to please Minette, help Minette -- but it is pretty clear, despite (and perhaps because of) her liberal upbringing, that Genna has no idea who Minette is or what she needs. Oates does a fantastic job of leaving us uneasy with ourselves... it takes a lot of work to fully sympathize with Minette, no matter how much we may want to. You have to imagine Genna, despite her eagerness to love and understand, feels the same way.

A pageturner. One of my favorite Oates works. ( )

This book called to me a few weekends ago when I was browsing at Tattered Cover in Denver.

I had forgotten my first encounter with Joyce Carol Oates.

When Steve saw what I had bought, he was surprised. He reminded me that I had read his copy of a Joyce Carol Oates novel (neither of us could remember what it was) and had not liked it.

At all.

Hmmmm.

As it turns out, the offending book was We are the Mulvaneys.

When I told Steve what the book was that I didn't like, he asked me what I thought of this one. I replied, "I liked it better than the last one."

Not a rousing endorsement.

Don't get me wrong. Black Girl/White Girl held my interest. I read it in 2 days.

I found a lot of truths in it about relationships between the races.

I was struck by how unlikeable the black girl of the title, Minette Swift, was.

I liked how the subplot about Genna and her father slowly took over and became the plot.

I found parts of it unreasonably obtuse. There was a little too much mystery and opaqueness surrounding Genna's memories of incidents during her childhood and her dealings with her parents while at the same time her memories of her time with Minette were crisply focused.

Black Girl/White Girl is not an uplifting book. Nobody in it is or ends up happy.

Yet, all that being said, I'm glad I read it. I guess that means I'd have to give it a thumbs up.

From the back cover:

In 1975 Genna Hewett-Meade's college roommate died a mysterious, violent death partway through their freshman year. Minette Swift had been assertive, fiercely individualistic, and one of the few black girls at their exclusive, "enlightened" college - and Genna, daughter of a prominent civil defense lawyer, felt duty-bound to protect her at all costs. But fifteen years later, while reconstructing Minette's tragic death, Genna is forced to painfully confront her own past life and identity . . . and her deepest beliefs about social obligation in a morally gray world.

Black Girl/White Girl is a searing double portrait of race and civil rights in post-Vietnam America, captured by one of the most important literary voices of our time. ( )

Genna Meade is the well-meaning daughter of well-to-do, radical hippie parents. Her college roommate Minette, the daughter of an African American minister, is reserved, prickly, eccentric and unpopular. Genna is almost desperate to win Minette's friendship, but a series of racist incidents in their dorm complicates their relationship and sets the stage for a tragedy.

As always, Oates presents finely drawn characters and an engrossing story. My only criticism is that Genna seems too naive, politically and socially, considering her home environment. The college, too, seemed quaint and genteel, and I doubt even a Main Line women's college was genteel in the 1970s. ( )

Publishers Weekly Review: In 1975, racial tension still runs high at Genna Meade's mostly white Schuyler College in Pennsylvania. Her outcast black roommate, Minette Swift, is a D.C. preacher's daughter; Genna is descended from the college's founder. Minette misses home desperately; Genna, in contrast, avoids her "hippie" mother's phone calls while yearning for a visit from her absentee father, activist lawyer Maximilian Meade. Despite their differences, the girls muster an effortful friendship, due to the near-fetishization of black culture that Genna's parents have inculcated in her. When racist incidents begin to plague Minette, Genna tries to protect her, but Minette lapses into an antisocial, dangerous depression. Meanwhile, Genna has her own problems???she's gradually piecing together clues to a mystery whose solution may lie far too close to home for comfort. Eventually, Minette's downward spiral prompts a shocking epiphany for Genna that will alter the course of her family's life. Oates bravely grapples with the fallout of the Civil Rights movement, the early '70s backlash against Summer of Love optimism, and the well-intentioned but ultimately condescending antiracist piety of privileged white liberals, but this anecdotal novel feels slight compared to her best work.
Source:(Oct.) --Staff (Reviewed June 19, 2006) (Publishers Weekly, vol 253, issue 25, p35)

Genna Meade is both the daughter of Mad Max Meade, an outspoken, liberal lawyer, and the roommate of Minette Swift, a black preacher's daughter come to Schuyler College on a scholarship. When racists events begin to occur, Genna feels both entangled and abandoned. So perceptive it sometimes made me uncomfortable. ( )

I anm a new reader of Joyce Carol Oates, having resisted her for many years because I found her writing to be too dense. However, having read and thoroughtly enjoyed The Falls, a book club selection, I think I'm a fan. This unsually slim novel (for Oates) is utterly comelling in its realistic depiction of southern blacks against a backdrop of an elite New England school. The two main characters ring true, the plot is riveting and the ending is astonishing. ( )

Good. Not as good as We were the Mulvaneys or Missing Mom, but still interesting. ( )

A story of two roommates in the mid-1970s, an insecure white girl of a notable family and a black girl attending as a merit scholar as told from the white girl's viewpoint. Both girls have some serious personal issues. Ultimately through this tale Oates is discussing race relations here in the US. She says, "We're roommates, but how well do we really know each other?" ( )

Black Girl / White Girl
Black Girl / White Girl is the story of two 1974 Schuyler College freshmen roommates who could not have possibly been more wrong for each other. Gemma Meade, on the one hand, is a descendant of the college founder and has been raised by ultra-liberal parents to feel somewhat guilty about the privileged circumstances of the Meade family. She feels compelled to prove that she does not consider herself to be better than her black roommate. Minette Swift, on the other hand, is a black teenager who has been raised by her ultra-conservative preacher father to be suspicious of the motives and objectives of whites who go out of their way to befriend her. She sees Gemma's offer of friendship as more condescending than genuine.

Both girls arrive at Schuyler College somewhat flawed by the families in which they were raised. Gemma's father, an attorney who not only defended Civil Rights activists and terrorists of the day but hid them when they were on the run and helped to fund their illegal activities, was away from home as much as he was there. Her mother, an alcoholic ex-hippie herself, was more a burden to Gemma than she was a parent. Minette's father, a "prominent" Washington D.C. preacher, raised her to disdain those who did not share her strong Christian beliefs and to find racist tendencies in others where they did not always exist. He was a proud and articulate man who spoke his mind at all times, quick to see "racism" in the words of others.

Reading Black Girl / White Girl is a bit like simultaneously watching two train wrecks. Predictably, Minette Swift becomes the victim of racist taunts despite the fact that she is not the only minority student living in her dormitory. She is so unlikable, in fact, that another black student is suspected of being involved in the incidents that occur. Gemma's efforts to shield Minette from the taunting ultimately backfire and cause as much harm as good for both girls. At the same time, Gemma's father is being pursued by the FBI who suspect him of being more than a defense attorney and who suspect that Gemma knows the details.

Joyce Carol Oates has created two memorable characters, unlikable as they may be, who reflect the times in which they lived. The 1970s were filled with guilt ridden whites who were very likely seen by blacks as naive and condescending when it came to the racial issues of the day. The two groups were a product of the '60s era that produced both peace loving,doper hippies and militant blacks and they found themselves working together in the '70s, not always comfortably, in the still relatively young Civil Rights movement. In the world of Joyce Carol Oates, good intentions and innocence can be a dangerous combination and Black Girl / White Girl is no exception to the rule

Rated at 3.5 ( )

Only okay. Oates never gets into who Minette is. I didn't really care about the white girl. ( )