Daughter: A Novel [Paperback]

asha bandele (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 28, 2004

At nineteen, Aya is a promising Black college student from Brooklyn who is struggling through a difficult relationship with her emotionally distant mother, Miriam. One winter night, Aya is shot by a white police officer in a case of mistaken identity. Keeping vigil by her daughter's hospital bed, Miriam remembers her own youth: her battle for independence from her parents, her affair with Aya's father, and the challenges of raising her daughter. But as Miriam confronts her past -- her losses and regrets -- she begins to heal and discovers a tentative hopefulness.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Solemn and occasionally maudlin, this first novel by the author of the acclaimed memoir The Prisoner's Wife tells a tragic, too-familiar story: a promising young African-American is mistakenly shot by the police in Brooklyn, N.Y. Nineteen-year-old Aya has been getting her life together after a brush with the law and is working hard to earn a college degree. Only the coolness of her beautiful, distant single mother, Miriam, prevents her from being truly happy. When Aya is gravely wounded, Miriam is forced to face her own past and examine her emotionally arid life. Shifting focus rather clumsily, Bandele chronicles Miriam's strict upbringing and forbidden romance with sweet Bird, an ambitious janitor. Miriam loses Bird just before Aya is born, and when Aya is taken from her, too, she resorts to violence. Though she ends up in prison, she is finally able to tentatively connect with others again, meditating on a line by Aya's favorite poet, Sonia Sanchez: "I shall become a collector of me/ And put meat on my soul." Bandele tells her story in simple language, though plaintive asides ("have you ever told me a joke, Mommy, or kissed me just because?"), and italicized laments ("Oh God, didn't I pay with Bird?") give the novel a sentimental veneer. Bandele's low-key take on a grim aspect of the urban black experience stands in refreshing contrast to more sensationalistic renditions, but Miriam's muddled final epiphany will leave readers wishing for something more.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

A black mother's rage and sorrow drive this passionate first novel about a beloved daughter shot dead by the police on the streets of Brooklyn. The story begins with smart college student Aya Rivers chafing at her controlling, secretive mother, Miriam. Out running one day, Aya is shot dead by a policeman. It's a case of mistaken identity. No one is accountable. Then the story switches to Miriam, alone, remembering her break from her cold, secretive home and her love for Aya's dad, Bird. Aya never knew him, never knew that he survived Vietnam only to be shot dead by the police in the war at home. Bandele, an editor for Essence magazine and author of the memoir The Prisoner's Wife (1999), writes about family grief and bitterness with searing immediacy. Woven into the mother-daughter story, Bird's life of hope and heartbreak is beautifully told, his dreams of college, family, and work destroyed even before his murder. The angry message is sometimes overwhelming, but this powerful story does what the author asks for: it breaks the silence. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Scribner (December 28, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743417984
• ISBN-13: 978-0743417983
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #312,048 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Secrets and Lies Can Kill, October 8, 2003

By 

renaynay "renaynay" (Tallahassee, Florida United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Daughter: A Novel (Hardcover)

Daughter is one of those soul-stirring works that seizes your attention. It compels you to glimpse into your own life and seek change within yourself. Thought-provoking, loving, and moving, asha bandele has written a novel about the relationship between a mother and daughter who never really knew one another -- until it was too late.

Miriam is the giving mother who would do anything to ensure Aya's needs were met. Yet, she wasn't the kind of mother who gave hugs freely, said "I love you" just because, or allowed herself to speak openly with her daughter. She felt the less Aya knew about her past, the less hurt and disappointed she would be.

Aya, at the opening of the novel, is a 19-year-old college student who made excellent grades and did what she was told. Although she loves her mother dearly, her only wish is to know who her father was. All she's ever really known about Bird was that he was a Vietnam War veteran.

Bird was so much more than that, as we find out. Miriam has a past with Bird that goes a lot deeper than Aya could ever know. But sadly, she never finds out because her life is tragically taken from her by police who mistakenly kill her. And Miriam not only grieves for her daughter, but grieves for things she's always known but could never tell Aya.

bandele's writing is superb and one could almost lose herself in the lyrical, surreal writing from a writer who seems destined to be one of our most renowned Black authors.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the BEST books ever ....., March 26, 2005

By 

NicoleWasHere (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Daughter: A Novel (Hardcover)

I have finished reading this book and it IS one of THE BEST books I have read in MY LIFE.
This will be my new gift book for the women friends in my life.
Ahhh ..... it had truly captured my heart.
If you have a daughter, if you are a daughter, if you know a daughter, if you plan on having a daughter ..... BUY THIS BOOK!
It is about a woman who's daughter is killed by the police.
It goes into her life and the relationship, or lack of relationship she had with her daughter.
It is about not holding back.
It is about words never said.
It is about regret.
It is about LIVING regardless of the heartbreak.
It is about love lost ..... BUT having the courage to still get up and LIVE.
It is about having a voice regardless of the shame.
It is about the shame and sharing the story of shame.
Oh, it is about LIFE.
I love it.
It has touched something deep inside of me.
I am so full of emotions when I think about the many messages of this book.
Oh, and the writing is so GOOD.
Asha is one hell of a writer.
I can't wait for her to write more.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars TOUCHING, October 8, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Daughter: A Novel (Hardcover)

Its been a long time since I read a book that touched me the way Daughter has. After reading The Prisoners Wife I was looking forward to reading asha bandele's next book. One Sunday while attending the 5th Ave Book Fair in NYC I had the pleasure of meeting asha and her daughter. I was fortunate to have her autograph my copy of Daughter. I couldn't wait to start reading and once I started I wasn't dissapointed.
I was swept up in the story of Miriam and Aya. As a mother with 2 daughters I understand the delicate balance of the mother/daughter relationship.
asha bandele is as very talented writer and I look forward to reading more from her.