This book was recommended to me for a good read, at first I couldn't get into it, but then it became very interesting. I am not a child of an interracial relationship, but I have had a curiosity about how they live their lives. Birdie/Jesse had a very difficult time growing up because she had so many things to deal with as a maturing adolescent. To be bi-racial, to have to assume another identity, to have to live without your father and sister, to have to pretend to of another religion, to have to lie about your truest feelings and then lie about your ethnicity to everyone you meet on top of becoming an adolescent must be the most difficult thing for a young woman, especially in the 70's/early 80's. I commend Danzy Senna for writing this book, because I am sure there are a lot of young woman that can identify with the subject matter. The book got a little long winded at times, but overall it was very well written and very enlightening. Good background (Boston, MA), good time period and good story.

I was immediately captured by Danzy Senna's "Caucasia", and very impressed with her writing--the characters, neighborhoods, cities, and situations she describes are all very vivid and realistic. The story line itself was intriguing and thought-provoking; two bi-racial sisters separated in childhood by their parents break-up, the dark-skinned daughter disappearing with their Black father, and the fair-skinned daughter disappearing with their White mother. This split along skin-color lines has a huge impact on the lives of both girls, who are suddenly forced to move on with the formation of their identities without each other, when once they were intertwined with a fierce sisterly bond, and a secret language called Elemeno. I think being bi-racial myself is what drew me to this book originally, but the many different issues and themes in the book (racism, identity, political and philosophical fanatacism, etc)kept my interest. In my family, my mother is Black, and my father is White, and the book made me wonder if Cole and Birdie would have been separated the same way if their father Deck had been White, and their mother Sandy had been Black. A great read! I would highly recommend it to anyone.

I couldn't put this book down, I had to know how it ended. I'm always looking for that page turner, but most often not finding it. Then Caucasia appears ... a jewel.