Book review: What We Lose

IN her debut novel, set in Pennsylvania, New York, and Johannesburg, Zinzi Clemmons takes on big subjects. 

She explores cancer, death, race, and sex in an unflinching, but not fearless, manner. She is fearful. Cancer is frightening and relentless. Dying is painful and sordid. Racism is all around. And sex can be dangerous.

Thandi, as a light-skinned African American woman, challenges the way others see her. She describes herself as a ‘strange in-betweener’, one who never feels accepted. Her mother warns her not to make friendships with women whose skins are darker than her own, stating that, inevitably, envy will lead to rancour.