Patsy: A Novel
Heralded for writing "deeply memorable . . . women" (Jennifer Senior, New York Times), Nicole Dennis-Benn introduces readers to an unforgettable heroine for our times: the eponymous Patsy, who leaves her young daughter behind in Jamaica to follow Cicely, her oldest friend, to New York. Beating with the pulse of a long-withheld confession and peppered with lilting patois, Patsy gives voice to a woman who looks to America for the opportunity to love whomever she chooses, bravely putting herself first. But to survive as an undocumented immigrant, Patsy is forced to work as a nanny, while back in Jamaica her daughter, Tru, ironically struggles to understand why she was left behind. Greeted with international critical acclaim from readers who, at last, saw themselves represented in Patsy, this astonishing novel "fills a literary void with compassion, complexity and tenderness" (Joshunda Sanders, Time), offering up a vital portrait of the chasms between selfhood and motherhood, the American dream and reality.
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Community Reviews
The second book that I’ve read from Nicole, I love her style and this novel is very special because it’s the story of a Jamaican inmigran woman living in the States, and the separation with her family.
This book broke my heart. It's a compassionate and courageous exploration of poverty, colorism, and homophobia as well as the struggles and vulnerability of being an undocumented immigrant in America.
A woman abandons her 5 year old daughter in Jamaica and moves to America in hopes of creating a better future and being with her best friend whom she’s loved since she was a child. When she gets to America she learns that it’s not all it’s cracked up to be, but she can’t go back to Jamaica. She can’t face her past and the child she abandoned. She’s stuck in a place of no upward movement.
Her daughter Tru, is raised by her father and his wife who seems to love Tru, but Tru won’t allow her too as she longs for her mother. As Tru grows the pain of her mother’s abandonment gets worse and she deals with it in unhealthy ways. Tru tries to find herself and her place in the world with the love she has for football, but it’s not enough.
As a Jamaican, I never thought of how parents migrating to different foreign countries would affect the people left behind. My father migrated when I was 8 years old and while I was sad, I never truly felt his absence because he always kept I’m contact with me. Tru, however, never experienced that. Her mother left her with no communication. Patsy in my eyes was a terrible mother. How can you just up and leave your child like that to a man who didn’t seem to want anything to do with her.
A great read and highly recommended!
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