A review by sausome
The House of Discarded Dreams by Ekaterina Sedia

5.0

Amazing, absolutely amazing! I loved this book -- full of fantastically fantastical goings on, as Ekaterina Sedia is so good at. I also loved that the main character, Vimbai, is studying marine biology and loves horseshoe crabs. She's also the daughter of Zimbabwean parents, migrating to New Jersey when she was little. She has battled her whole life with her identity as an American, Zimbabwean, black-but not black enough for her American peers, African-but not African enough for her Africana Studies professor-mother. She moves out of her parents' house to a house on the Jersey dunes, with two other people -- Maya and Felix. Strange things start happening, such as the ghost of Vimbai's African grandmother showing up, Felix extracts a "psychic energy baby" from the phone lines and his hair is more apparently a kind of wavy black hole atop his head, and their house floats onto the ocean and begins changing into their dreams and imaginations on the inside. Vimbai remembers African tales from childhood that her grandmother told her and her Kenyan babysitter told her, and these start appearing in the house (like the catfish "man-fish" who is huge, long-lived, and an eater of souls). She also evaluates her sexuality and her strong love for a girl in 8th grade, with whom she never really talked to much, just admired from afar, and considers her feelings for Maya in her new home. Maya deals with her grandmother's death, leaving her alone in the world, while Vimbai realizes she has more in common with her mother and father than she thought -- she's been trying so hard to deny the African within her, and her heritage, irritated with how much her mother criticizes America and gets angry about assumptions people make about Africans; she's also enraged that a white man is head of the Africana Studies department at the university where she works. The writing was gorgeous, full of luscious descriptions, and there were so many layers to the story that I almost want to read it again right now!