Customer Reviews

The Wedding: A Novel

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Shelby Coles chooses a husband, and this should be cause for a glorious celebration for the pampered summer residents of The Oval at Martha's Vineyard. However, it is the skin color of her beloved that unravels the underlying issues of race, identity, and history among these people. Set in the 50s, The Wedding portrays generational and contemporary issues among a group of upper-class African-Americans. The reader is allowed to glimpse into the most personal of issues with the various characters including Shelby herself, her mother, her father, and her grandmother. When a horrible tragedy is introduced into the mix, we also see how these characters either pull together or fall apart.

Yes, this is a novel that touches on racial issues and "place" in society. It is difficult to present these characters without also presenting the way that skin color affects all aspects of their lives. However, I really appreciate the intricate family relationships that are presented in this story. West does an amazing job of painting some realistic people during a very confusing time in American history.
(mellion108 from Michigan)

I have never read a book that touched my heart, made me laugh, made me cry, and written with such great depths of reality as "The Wedding". I could not put this book down because of the special relationship of Shelby and her sister. Shelby is the exact opposite of her sister. Shelby marries for love while her sister marries for class status and acceptance. The bond and relationship that these sisters share enhances the book further by showing the intricate relationships in the family. It has been a year or more since i've read this book, so you'll have to pardon me if i have any facts wrong, and yet i long to read it once again. Shelby shows her family that love is not determined by race or class but it is defined by truth. Shelby's character shows strength even at times when she is unsure of her own identity. I especially remember the time when shelby ran away and the people in the town couldn't find her because they thought Shelby was white. The story has a tragic ending which I did not anticipate unlike many books or movies which are so predictable. Each character in the book has their own flaws, strength and beauty. Although it is a work of fiction, this book is educational by the fact that it shows how assumptions, ideologies and expectations of class, race,gender, marriage damage,corrupt and influence people in society. Dorothy West's writing is simplistic yet eloquent as the story is constructed and built upon the lives and history of a family. The telling of the story through a family tree concept is not only original, but intellectual. It is a great work of literature that transcends time by the lessons it teaches. This book is "Unforgettable".

Dorothy West shines in this novel about the African American middle class. Because so much of our history has been downplayed or dismissed, this book provides a breathtaking glimpse into a world that many African Americans never even knew existed. THE WEDDING is the story of Shelby Cole, beloved daughter of the prominent Coles family. But more than that, it is the story of black culture, that part that both embraced and rejected itself. It is the story of love outside of the color-divide and it is the story of how no matter how hard we try and how hard we try to dismiss it---color is, and will always be an issue. It's not a white issue or a black issue but a human issue. Dorothy West presents it in a way that is upfront and honest. She doesn't try to "whitewash" the history of color-struckness that continues to plague many in the African American community. Through the story of the Coles family, she began to hack away, even if only a little, at the very core of what continues to divide and in some cases conquer the African American community's ability to move on from our shackled past.

Perhaps the last surviving major figure from the Harlem Renaissance, Dorothy West was coaxed to write this lovely short novel by her fellow denizen of Martha's Vineyard Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (who was also her editor until her death a few years before the novel's publication). It's a charming lyrical work whose brevity belies its complexity. It's a very sophisticated study of how decades of Americans of all races in social and financial struggle form a generational underpinning to the wedding of Shelby Coles, the beautiful scion of a well-to-do African-American family on "The Oval," a black bourgeois island community based based on the town of Oak Bluffs on Martha's Vineyard. Shelby's forebears, as West shows us, have tied themselves in knots over distinctions of race and class that sometimes overlap and that sometimes are at odds with one another; the question becomes whether or not she can manage to strike for herself in a new manner or repeat both the mistakes and successes of her sister, parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. West is a superb stylist as well as social commentator, and the writing is gorgeous and extremely thoughtful. The book is hurt only by its hurried ending, which seems to force a realization in Shelby that ties everything together too neatly.

This book was an absolute pleasure to read--and offered many wonderful perspectives about prejudices and its idiosyncracies. Not through preaching, but via great story telling. The characters are rich and full of personality. More than a few become inspirations. How well-to-do blacks rose to prominence through hard work and education only to take on the characteristics typical of all upper middle class regardless of color is a fascinating journey. Ms. West's writing is clean and straightforward, a joy to read.

I didn't enjoy this book because of many reasons, but the main one was that it was too hard to follow. It went from past to present too many times for me to stay interested in it. There was too much detail in it also, spreading things out and losing my interest. There also wasn't a clear plot through out the story. It seemed like a lot of little plots that weren't very entertaining and the book became boring after a while. There also wasn't a issue that was carried throughout the book except the struggle that some of her ancestors had to go through to be excepted in society. There was a plot in the beginning that only came out in the last twenty pages. Those last twenty pages were very interesting and kept my interest, but I would have liked the whole book to keep my interest and maybe only twenty pages lose it. The book wasn't even really about a wedding but reflections before it. There weren't even any conflicts between characters that lasted more than a few pages. For these reasons, I would not recommend this book for anyone to read.

I loved the beginning of West's The Wedding. Her characters are always fully developed and her plots are intricate. However, being a woman of African descent and not inclined to play the skin-color game, I found the frequent references to skin tone tedious and pretty soon tired of the reading. That's not to say that I won't pick it up and finish it (I can't get away from several of the characters in the book). West knows a lot about race relations on the east coast and I find that fascinating. I find her works are intriguing as Dr. Morrison's. As a writer, I love her flow of words and the scenic structure of her settings. As an African American who spends a great deal of time teaching young Black citizens that the love of your color comes from the inside out and not just something worn on a tee-shirt, I find that some of her characters too defeating or, rather, defeated because there are too many instances when the quality of their lives are lessened because they refuse to get beyond things that have been instilled on us through colonization.

The Wedding by Dorothy West was quite interesting. In the beginning I didn't really get the idea of the story. The setting seemed to be in the past and the present, switching back and forth. It also had many characters that I wasn't able to comprehend. There seemed to be many different plots, and not just one main one. I really like the idea how Dorothy West spindled the characters all together. I like how everyone was tied together at the end - all related to ancestry. The story is really on a nice track about racism and romance. I really like how the marriages turned out to be peaceful at the end. The book wasn't really about a wedding, but about the past relationships. I recommend this book to people who can sit through a long, heart- warming story. You may need to use weird vocabulary but you'll get through it! It's great how West partly includes you in her stories. Totally recommend it to ages 13 and up!

Dorthy West is a wonderful writer. I have enjoyed reading "The Wedding." Her writing style is very unique and pleasing to the soul. She writes with tonz of emotion and really knows how to get her readers hooked. She puts many descriptive similies throughout her story such as, "He withdrew in this awkward manner not because it was his wont but because he found he could not tear his eyes from Gram's, gripped as he was by the implacable irony in them that seemed to strip him and pin him to the wall like a bug in a case." This book protrays many interesting issues. Some are slavery, class, race, and gender distinctions within family, gender, and marriage.

I really enjoyed this book. I don't like reading long books so this 240 page book was a perfect length for me. I liked it for many reasons. It brought up many issues and situations that happened during the time when slavery was being abolished. It not only gave a strong description of the story, but of the true life blacks had to live by. It opened my eyes to new ideas about inter-race relationships and gave me a better understanding of what marriage is. At the end of the book Dorthy West states that, "Color was a false distinction; love was not." It also gave me a new meaning of what love is and that it's what is in the inside that counts.

I would recomend this book to anyone who is wanting a quick and easy read. It is a enjoyable and relaxing book. It might not all make sence in the beginning, but it all comes together in the end. I know that it has changed my prospectives on some issues and mabey it will change yours too.

Dorothy West offers wonderful insight on stereotypes, blood ties, and finding ones identity. Her novel, The Wedding, leaves an impacting viewpoint for the reader from those inside of the "blue-veined society" and those outside, the "pure". In other words, all races gain a greater understanding of who they are and from whence they came. I believe that West tried to reach the conflict indirectly by sharing the main character's ancestral stories. West creates this continuing saga of decisions the men and women of the family must make. Every link on the family tree represented a dilemma. These people had to choose a mate for life, but was it ever for true love? Instead these marriages represented racial differences and social and class rankings. In the book the main character, "had been forced to admit that identity was not inherent." It is now her turn to be her own person and make some very important decisions in creating a new generation link in her family tree. The reader has to dig deep to find these inner messages that West offers. I thought that the quote from the novel, "The rest of your life would be so much easier if you'd only stop picking the scab of the sore" captures one of West's main ideas. One character in this novel is a catalyst to the problem. She dwellsa on the past, bringing other family members into the story. If she were only to let go of her stubbornness, and let old wounds heal,she may be able to accept the choices her own blood relatives are making. Shelby, the main character, has an important decision to make in this book. Will she marry for love or to please the other members of her family? I suggest you read this book so that you too can gain the thoughtful insight and deep meaning in, The Wedding.