Short Stories in Novel Attire

Edwidge Danticat's Claire of the Sea Light (2013) is consistent in that it showcases Danticat's wonderfully vivid, poetic prose. Set in the fictional seaside town of Ville Rose in Haiti, the novel narrates the intertwined stories of the titular Claire Limyè Lanmè Faustin and a few other characters who inhabit the town. Kamila Shamsie who reviewed the book for The Guardian captured the essence of the novel by writing the following:

Danticat shows us a town scarred by violence, corruption, class disparities and social taboo, which is also a town of hope, dreams, love and sensuality. But these are enmeshed rather than opposing elements. Love leads to violence, dreams lead to corruption.

Assessed from a technical standpoint, Danticat's storytelling is rich, nuanced, and complex. Her characters are fully developed, infused with a certain dignity in spite of their challenges. Similarly, the setting is expansive and fully envisioned, a symbolic character throughout the novel, made up of eight interlocking stories comprising of love, loss, and redemption, of sorts.

My biggest critique of Claire of the Sea Light is its packaging: It is presented as a novel when really, it works best as a collection of short stories. This is due to the eight stories included being related to but independent of each other. The titular Claire is only seen in chapters one and eight, and while her disappearance on her seventh birthday is presented as the catalyst for the subsequent chapters, it really isn't. As such, this specific aspect of the story becomes a gimmick, one which spins a convoluted narrative that really need not have been structured as it was.

Claire of the Sea Light is altogether a successful and enchanting story, well worth the read, not only because of the beauty and richness of Danticat's use of language but also because her story gives insight into a people and culture not so well-known or represented in western literature. Compared to its predecessors from the author, however, Claire of the Sea Light falls slightly short of expectations.

Crossposted CBR9 review.