Reviews with content warning for Slavery - Black Cake

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Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson

19 reviews

midnightverde's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I was hooked from the very beginning! What an amazing read about family, love, trauma, grief, culture, and more. I was so invested in the story and it did not disappoint. I love everything about it!!!

Content Warnings

thecriticalreader's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

I picked Black Cake as my free add-on because it was named one of the Book of the Month Club’s Book of the Year Finalists. All of the other finalists I had either read or did not appeal to me.

Blurb:

The book begins with two siblings, Byron and Benny, as they meet together for the first time in years because of their mother’s death. Byron is a successful and famous ocean scientist, who has achieved everything his Caribbean American parents expected of him, yet who struggles with emotional unavailability and interpersonal relationships. Benny is an aspiring café owner who has not spoken to her family in years after they reacted negatively to her dropping out of a prestigious university and coming out as multisexual. They meet together to hear a recording by their mother explaining that her past is not what she has led them to believe, forcing the siblings to reconsider their heritage, relationships, and identities.

Review:

Black Cake has a fluid structure: Wilkerson switches between perspectives, modes of storytelling, and time periods in order to tell her intergenerational story. Instead of being confusing or obnoxious, the constant change between perspectives and time frames serve the story well, as they allow Wilkerson to disclose information at a pace that suits the story as well as address the complexities and backstories of multiple characters. I found Byron and Benny to be a little obnoxious and childish at the beginning, but I grew to appreciate their struggles and personalities as I learned more about their backstories. I also really enjoyed learning about their mother’s history, which was full of twists and turns, and which painted a wonderful portrait of a strong, capable—although not perfect—woman and mother. The symbolism of their mother’s Black Cake recipe beautifully tied the story together.

Black Cake is divided into four parts, and by the end of the third part, I felt that things were starting to reach their natural concluding point. However, the book still had another part to it (approximately 140 more pages). As I read part four, I started liking Black Cake less and less. In the first three parts, the tragic accidents and serendipitous twists of fate served the narrative but stopped just short of being unbelievable. Unfortunately, Wilkerson overuses such devices in the fourth part, and the book lost all sense of believability for me.

For example, I was rather confused as to why the main characters were so afraid of retaliation from Little Man's family, despite it appearing extremely unlikely to me that such people would a) piece anything together and b) have the desire, decades later, to do something about it. Perhaps it would have been more believable if Wilkerson had showed earlier on an example of his family being excessively vindictive or clever.

Each improbable turn of events was too coincidental, too well-placed—in short, too fictional.

The story seems to lose focus in part four as it tried to include resolutions for all of its characters, and Benny and Byron’s character arcs fall by the wayside. A couple of chapters seem completely superfluous, especially one in which a completely unimportant side character faces police brutality. The incident is only tenuously related to the main story and is never referred to again after that singular chapter. If Black Cake had stopped while it was ahead around the 250-page mark, it would have been a solid 4 or 4.25 rating for me. Its meandering and unbelievability toward the end, however, brings it down to a 3.25 for me.

The Run-Down:

You will probably like Black Cake if: you enjoy multi-generational stories with complex characters, books that celebrate the diversity of its characters, and themes of heritage, family, personal sacrifice, and identity.

You might not like Black Cake if you dislike shifting POVs and large casts of characters. Readers who have a hard time suspending their disbelief when it comes to certain narrative coincidences and connections might also find this book frustrating.

A Similar Book:

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. Similarities between these two books include:

· An epic plot that spans multiple generations of a single family

· Themes of identity, heritage, belonging

· A main character who runs away and changes their identity

· Characters who get caught up in illegal gangster activity

Content Warnings

annabulkowski's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Content Warnings

kyrstin_p1989's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

A story of loss and unwavering love. A story that asks, what are you willing to do? This book is a slow burn but well worth it. The story of this family and what one woman endured is touching and brilliant. This novel explores the complexities of family, race, immigration, and womanhood while using linguistic mastery to make descriptions richer and more beautiful. The sea is quite possibly the shining character in this novel and it made me long for a trip to see the power of the ocean.

Content Warnings

wellreadmegs's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

"Untold stories shape people's lives both when they are withheld and when they are revealed."

Black Cake is a multigenerational story about family, identity, and parenthood. It spans different continents and different countries.

Things i liked: Multiple POVs, short chapters, the weaving of stories, and learning more about Caribbean and Chinese cultures.

Things that I didn't love: how slow-moving the first 100 pages of the book was. A lot of descriptions of water and lot of characters to learn in the beginning.

Read this if you enjoy: complicated family dynamics, second-chances, coming-of-age stories. Overall I thought the book was beautifully written and the second half of the book really picked up. The way characters were introduced was clever and kept you guessing. I thought the ending was wrapped together nicely and I felt at peace with it. It's always interesting to think about your parents' life before you were born. It's something none of us can fully fathom.

Content Warnings