Red Island House

I picked this up because I recently read Best American Short Stories 2021, which includes a chapter of this book. Reading that chapter, I recalled reading another story by Lee in the New Yorker which was also a chapter in the book. I thought both stories were excellent, so I dived into the book, which, while called a novel, is more of a novel in stories. Which is fine with me, because it's a form I like. The over-arching narrative isn't a single plot, but is the story of a marriage, from its early days until the couple's later years, between an African American woman and an Italian man. Early on, the man builds a vacation home for them in Madagascar and their lives on the island (a fictional smaller island off the coast of the main island) lead to lots of story-worthy events.

Besides the engaging characters, this is a smart book about big issues that could be summed up as post-colonial. And now I'm an Andrea Lee fan, because I liked this book so much.

This is one of my favorite books of the year. It's a cliché, but I really didn't want it to end. Speaking of the ending, I didn't love that, but it felt authentic. I appreciate the way she re-created the location. The storylines were fascinating and detailed — believable. I wasn't really sure that a PhD who teaches Toni Morrison and African-American studies would fall into the role that Shay does, but she definitely has to address that by the end. Fascinating read, And also an escape to the island.