THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 12, 1994 TAG: 9406080410
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY RITA B. DANDRIDGE
DATELINE: 940612 LENGTH: Medium
Blacker Than a Thousand Midnights is Susan Straight's third book in four years. It follows Aquaboogie: A Novel in Stories (1990), a Milkweed National Fiction Prize winner, and I've Been in Sorrow's Kitchen and Licked Out All the Pots (1992), named a ``best book'' by The New York Times Book Review and USA Today and praised for its brilliant portrayal of Marietta Cook, a proud black South Carolina woman.
{REST} Straight's new novel continues the plot of Sorrow's Kitchen and explores further the life of Darnell Tucker, first seen in Aquaboogie. It opens in Rio Seco, an east Los Angeles suburb where Darnell Tucker resides. While Blacker Than a Thousand Midnights has potential, it falls short of expectation.
The novel's title derives from a line in ``The Creation,'' a poetic sermon in James Weldon Johnson's God's Trombones. Straight's fictional creation of Rio Seco, in which Tucker triumphs over the criminal elements in his environment, lacks the explosive beauty that Johnson's universe contains. Straight's plot unfolds without climax.
At 20, Tucker marries his childhood sweetheart, Brenda Batiste, who is six months pregnant. Laid off as a firefighter and with no cash and no insurance, he dabbles in a series of odd jobs to feed his wife and baby girl Charolette. Drifting from part-time firefighter to gardener to hotel security guard, Tucker eventually starts his own lawn-care service with his father's prodding. Each day seems to repeat the previous one.
Even Tucker's home life seems matter of fact. His mother-in-law visits daily. His wife supports the family when he's not working; when he works, he brings his entire paycheck home. The biggest conflict comes when Brenda dislikes his staying away weekends to fight drought-induced fires in the hillsides. She fears for his life; he ignores her and pursues his love for choking fires.
In his racially diverse neighborhood called the Wild, Wild West, Tucker walks the straight and narrow, having once run dope to earn $500 to repair the Spider, his El Camino truck. He shuns alcohol and tobacco and devotes his energy to his family.
His friends - Perez, Victor, Ronnie, Melvin, Leon - all tease him about doing the ``daddy thang,'' but he ends up better off than they. Addicted to drugs, harassed by police, incarcerated or killed, they fall victims of the streets. Their escapades could make for interesting reading were they not couched in awkward flashbacks or cumbersome reportage.
The novel progresses with concept headings instead of chapter numbers. Titles such as ``Toe up and Smoke Dreaming,'' ``Hardwork,'' ``Confinement,'' ``To Ask,'' ``Proper Care and Maintenance,'' ``Wild Wild West'' and ``El Dia De Los Muertos'' announce each chapter's activities unequally ranked. ``To Ask'' covers six pages and ``Wild Wild West,'' 44. The captions suggest narrative variety, but the chapter lengths alternately entertain and bore.
Blacker Than a Thousand Midnights presents a subject seldom explored in American fiction - an honest, hard-working, family-oriented black man. But Straight's lengthy chapters and stilted narrative detract from this subject. Consequently, her power as a writer still resides with her first two works.
by CNB