Synopses & Reviews
It is so important to be aware of your surroundings. You need toknow where you are and what is there with you. Growing Up NiggerRich is a sign, if read carefully, that will let you know what'saround you and what it might do to you. What a great book for people, nomatter their race, who grew up 'nigger rich' and didn't even knowit.--Nikki Giovanni, poet Nigger rich is a colloquialism encompassing classdistinctions, a term used mainly by African Americans in reference toother African Americans, with an intent similar to that of other peopleisuse of the term nigger to refer to any person of color. Itwas, and remains, an expression of fear, of anger, and of envy.Through the complex web of this narrative, Gwendoline Y. Fortunejuxtaposes old South and new, privilege and powerlessness, andvarious visions of racial identity in this refreshing, heartbreaking novelabout growing up and coming home.From the moment Gayla Tyner returns to her hometown of Carolton, SouthCarolina after thirty years away up north, she is struck bythe reminders of her segregated youth. As she seeks to ease the pain ofhaving grown up nigger rich--with relative privilege in someplaces, reviled and teased in others--she must also come to terms with herphilandering husband, domineering father, and all of the relationships, secrets, and pleasures that continue to call her home.ABOUT THE AUTHORBorn in Houston, Texas, Gwendoline Y. Fortune grew up hearing storiesof her mixed blood heritage: a free-born blackgreat-grandfather, Native Americans, Scots-Irishmen, a cowboy grandfather, a Confederate great-grandfather, and relatives who were missionaries inpre-World War II China. She went to college at the age of fifteen and hasbeen writing ever since. Selections from Growing Up Nigger Richplaced in the top twelve entries of the annual Pirateis Alley FaulknerSociety competition and second place in the National Black WritersiConference Awards. She lives in Saxapahaw, North Carolina.
Synopsis
An intricately crafted novel of homecoming and the South. Gayla Tyner is haunted by the South, what it means, has meant, and is becoming, as she struggles to find her place as professor, mother, wife, and daughter.