The Vanishing Half: A Novel

Summary - The Vanishing Half: A Novel

The Vanishing Half is a 2020 book by Brit Bennett. The novel is a multi-generational family saga set between the 1940s to the 1990s and centers on identical twin sisters Desiree and Stella Vignes. The two light-skinned black sisters were raised in Mallard, Louisiana, and witness the lynching of their father in the 1940s. In 1954, at the age of 16, the twins run away to New Orleans. However, Stella disappears shortly thereafter. In 1968, Desiree leaves an abusive marriage in Washington, D.C., and returns to Mallard with her eight-year-old daughter, Jude. Jude grows older and moves to Los Angeles through a track scholarship at the University of California, Los Angeles. While working part-time as a caterer in Beverly Hills, Jude sees a woman who appears to be her mother’s doppelgänger. The woman is actually Stella, who has been passing as white. The novel has a nonlinear narrative structure.

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