Book Review: “Queenie” by Candice Carty-Williams
“Queenie” by Candice Carty-Williams (2019)
Genre: Fiction, Contemporary, Adult
Page Length: 330 pages (hardcover edition)
Synopsis:
Queenie Jenkins is a 25-year-old Jamaican British woman living in London, straddling two cultures and slotting neatly into neither. She works at a national newspaper, where she’s constantly forced to compare herself to her white middle class peers. After a messy break up from her long-term white boyfriend, Queenie seeks comfort in all the wrong places…including several hazardous men who do a good job of occupying brain space and a bad job of affirming self-worth.
As Queenie careens from one questionable decision to another, she finds herself wondering, “What are you doing? Why are you doing it? Who do you want to be?”—all of the questions today’s woman must face in a world trying to answer them for her. (description from Goodreads)
Review:
*WARNING: SOME SPOILERS AHEAD*
Queenie is the story of a young twenty-something named Queenie who is trying to navigate her life amidst a sea of changes. She and her boyfriend decide to go on a ” break” and it catapults many other events in her life as a domino effect. Like the cover states in the blurb, Queenie slightly reminds me of a black Bridget Jones. Even though Queenie is experiencing such raw pain, indecision, and uncertainty about her work, love, and personal life she she tries to persevere the best way she knows how (through humor).
It may sound weird, but there is so much humor in this novel that it makes the reader laugh out loud despite the juxtaposition of all the hurt Queenie goes through on her journey. It showcases that there is always light in the midst of darkness. I loved Carty-Williams writing and her words had me hooked from page one. Her characters felt very real to me and I liked that she discussed a lot of topics such as gentrification, the Black Lives Matter movement, and mental health among many other things.
Queenie’s journey is not an easy own and I deeply felt her struggles as she tries to the reins of her life back one day at a time. There is no happy ending, but rather the promise that she will continue working towards getting better and working through her issues. I appreciated the conversation surrounding mental health and the stigma of it within the Black community and bringing awareness of how the conversation needs to shift.
I love the strong support system that Queenie’s has in this novel. Her friends and family may have unconventional ways of showing it, but they love her dearly. My favorite character is Kyakize. She’s sassy, unapologetic, and proud, but has the kind of realness you need in a good friend. She may seem superficial on the outside, but she tells it like it is and always has Queenie’s back!
This was a fantastic debut novel and I look forward to more of her future works. It was a novel that was hard to read at times, but is also lighthearted as well.
*Trigger Warnings: abuse, miscarriage, racism, mentions of suicide
Final Verdict:
