Rating: ★★★★★
Genre: Retelling, fiction
Synopsis: Boy Novak has escaped to rural Massachusetts and finds herself entangled with Arturo and his daughter, Snow Whitman. But when Boy gives birth and discovers that her daughter is black, she’s catapulted into an unexpected life of privileging beauty, and being a stepmother who could do much better.
Review: What an incredible book! Oyeyemi won my heart over a few years ago, so I was so glad to finally get cracking on this. Funnily enough, I decided to read this without knowing what it was about literally the day after we finished our Snow White week in my fairy tales class. At the very least, it gave me much to think about!
In this case, the fairest of them all doesn’t only pertain to beauty, but how whiteness correlates with beauty, how whiteness is perceived as niceness. This adds a really intriguing layer to the tale of Snow White, one that jars the usual expectations.
But Boy, Snow, and Bird’s perspectives all speak to their experiences about race, life, family, love, and carving a new path for one’s self. Love is a powerful tool, and it can easily be transformed into a weapon. Mirrors and beauty mean something different in this tale, and reflections and perceptions are what–or possibly what don’t–matter.
Oyeyemi does such a good job layering this fairy tale over real life and by complicating it even further through means of race, gender, and class. Overall, a fantastic book that I can’t help but to recommend to literally everybody.
little lady librarian 