Hello my lovely readers!
This has been a slow reading month for me. I'm working through two THICK biographies (hi #MegaMay!) one is about poet Ted Hughes and the other is about the father of who this book review is about, W.E.B. DuBois. Both are good, but incredibly dense and more than 500 pages. I'll finish them this month, but in the mean time, I blew through this book. Let's get into it!
SYNOPSIS
A century ago, Harlem’s glittering social scene had a single Yolande Du Bois, the only child of N.A.A.C.P. icon W.E.B. Du Bois. Yolande was bold, vivacious, and beloved of every gossip columnist. A true daddy’s girl, Yolande followed her father’s advice on from where she went to college (Fisk—Papa’s alma mater) to which sorority she joined (Delta Sigma Theta). But in matters of the heart, Yolande and her father did not agree. Dr. Du Bois himself curated a string of handsome suitors from the “Talented Tenth” for her, but Yolande’s true love was jazz musician Jimmie Lunceford, son of a working-class family from far-off Denver, Colorado. Their romance was an open secret, and more than a little scandalous.
Despite it all, Yolande wound up marrying her father’s famed poet Countee Cullen. Their lavish uptown wedding was the hottest social ticket of 1928. With three thousand attendees, sixteen bridesmaids, and Langston Hughes as a groomsman, it was truly a sight to behold.
But, immediately after the wedding, Yolande’s carefully constructed fairy tale begins to crumble. Torn between the expectations of her father and society and her heart’s true desire, Yolande is forced to decide whether she must leave Harlem to create a more authentic life on her own terms.
MY THOUGHTS
This was an entertaining, if not slow, read. It reminded me a lot of Harlem Rhapsody. Both books were incredibly slow and didn't ramp up until the book was halfway over. Yes, I know both authors researched their books at the same time. I wonder if they exchanged notes, because the format is also eerily similar. It also doesn't help that both books have a lot of the same characters. I digress.
It was interesting to learn more about the social scene of the Harlem Renaissance, especially from a young debutante's perspective. It must've been difficult for Yolande to try to grow into her own person when she carried the weight of her father's expectations.
Funnily enough, I'm currently reading the first volume of her father's biography and while it is a wonderful biography....whew W.E.B did not play! He was almost ill-inducing with how much pressure he placed on the Black race. And I understand, that he wants the Black race to be better, do better, be treated better, but he gave no grace sometimes. Yikes.
Another interesting note is that I recently had a phone conversation with Yolande DuBois's grandson, Jeffrey! We talked about DuBois' legacy, his mother (also named) Yolande, genealogy and the weight of carrying a legacy. It was lovely.
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