"Sun-blackened feet" you say? Hmm. [Red Island House by Andrea Lee]

 From National Book Award–nominated writer Andrea Lee comes Red Island House, a travel epic that opens a window on the mysterious African island of Madagascar, and on the dangers of life and love in paradise, as seen through the eyes of a Black American heroine.

“People do mysterious things when they think they have found paradise,” reflects Shay, the heroine of Red Island House. When Shay, an intrepid Black American professor, marries Senna, a brash Italian businessman, she doesn’t imagine that her life’s greatest adventure will carry her far beyond their home in Milan: to an idyllic stretch of beach in Madagascar where Senna builds a flamboyant vacation villa. Before she knows it, she becomes the reluctant mistress of a sprawling household, caught between her privileged American upbringing and her connection to the continent of her ancestors. So begins Shay’s journey into the heart of a remote African country. Can she keep her identity and her marriage intact amid the wild beauty and the lingering colonial sins of this mysterious world that both captivates and destroys foreigners?

A mesmerizing, powerful tale of travel and self-discovery that evokes Isabella Allende’s House of the Spirits and Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie’s Americanah, Red Island House showcases an extraordinary literary voice and gorgeously depicts a lush and unknown world.

For me, one of the key attractors to Andrea Lee's Red Island House is the centering of a Black American protagonist in a story centering the tensions and repercussions for said protagonist in living in a recreated colonial hierarchy in the island African nation of Madagascar. Shay, a Black American professor, married to her Italian businessman husband, Senna, finds herself routinely aghast at the way her life mimics that of an old White colonial mistress, finding herself always outside of fitting in, the Black woman who through marriage is in an elevated social standing amongst a diverse cast of European friends and island visitors, apart from the Black African locals and above them in local hierarchy.

Sometimes I doubted Shay's voice. Her writing off of macro and microaggressions was annoying, And sure, one deals with racist microaggressions in survival mode, but that lax attitude sometimes went to an extreme. I'd say my discomfort with it came to a head while she recounted her dealings with Maz, the Rhodesian South African. Why is this Black American woman who finds herself so often feeling the foreigner in this African country so okay glossing over or downplaying racism? 

Her personality, her approach to interracial, intercultural interactions was cringeworthy. Shay, in her prudish manner, reinforcing a caste-like hierarchy between the merchant/business class and the servant class, especially in the context of her own marriage to an older man, made no sense. I wanted better for her, for this Black woman, this Black American woman. To not be so ensconced and willing in the ways of wealthy Europeans in Africa. To assert herself and claim power in her marital relationship. For this educated, erudite African-American woman not to fall into colonial trappings and structures. But did she stand a chance?

And yet I can't deny that through Shay some very astute observations on colonial legacies were made. It's interesting that Shay essentially works as an expert exporting her culture for the gazing, perhaps voyeuristic eyes of her Italian students. Similarly, Shay experiences Madagascar voyeuristically, enjoying the highest levels of comfort, taking in her surroundings with a foreigner's skepticism and paternalistic condescension. But it's a life she chooses never to leave, regardless of how much I buy into her purported reasons for doing so.

But what is that take-away to be here? Am I supposed to feel for the White European foreigners who in the book make Madagascar their colonial fantasy background? Am I to see Shay as trapped? I do. Generally I felt bad for her. The path her marriage to Senna took was extremely predictable. Again, did she have a chance? But, she also made choices.

"...she never shakes the sensation that her leisure is built on old crimes."

While I can understand, and even support the sentiment, exploited local laborers finding reparations via sexual liaisons and genetic legacies with intruding would-be colonists, isn't it a lasting caste-like legacy of that same colonial hierarchy that brown bodies can only seek justice through the exploitation of their own bodies? As opposed to finding fault with the philandering man, the silver lining of economic justice shines through. To pretend this isn't a fact of life is a usual exercise of logic. But am I comfortable with it? Like I said, it really underlines the remnant of an ingrained economic, historical, and colonial interplay. As Shay imagines, with the White plantation mistress humiliated with the growing number of her husband's slave children, with whom should the anger lie? Not the exploited, raped slave women caught up in a terrible dynamic? No the local underage girls with little other recourse than sex trade? And all of this sentiment, this musing is conveyed, poetically? Something feels weird there.

"...she never shakes the sensation that her leisure is built on old crimes."

Shay, the mélange of African, European, and Algonquin heritage, fits easy into her role of pseudo-memsahib. Even Bertine, her housekeeper and confidant, fit the mammy trope with ease and precision. The idea of a mystic quality innate to the island feels like another Western fantasy. And so, for me, a lot of the attempts to subvert colonial ideas somewhat reinforces those same ideas. But I am also chalking a lot of that up to a lack of familiarity with Malagasy culture and writing. In her note, Lee cites inspiration from many Malagasy authors. I'd be lying to say a picture of Madagascar wasn't colorfully painted. But I, personally familiar with the landscapes of island cultures pimped out for tourist eyes, still question the degree of reflection of reality. 

Red Island House was an intriguing read. Compelling and believable in its depictions of White Europeans leeching local culture and exploiting post-colonial economic structures, I can't say I was sold on the depictions of the Malagasy characters, again, not that I have a solid reference, nor was I sold on the depiction of the Black American protagonist. But something about this read was warm and inviting. I feel most comfortable with 4 stars. I enjoyed it, but I side-eyed the book a couple times.

Red Island House (ISBN: 9781982137809) was due for publication March 2021.