This is me no longer stalling! After nearly three months of me figuratively scratching my head, procrastinating by reading and reviewing two palate cleansers
to get my mind right, and publishing my review of Homemade Love first, I'm finally returning to my first-ever Akwaeke
Emezi novel to try and make sense of it for myself in writing. I can't remember the last time I felt intimidated about addressing a book that I've read, but that's honestly the headspace I've been in. Now that we're here, let's see what I come up with!
You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi
Feyi is drawn to Alim immediately when Alim picks Feyi and Nasir up from the airport, and
despite her efforts to compartmentalize her wild thoughts and maintain her
distance from him, she and Alim keep having these unexpectedly deep
moments of connection. First, an unplanned meeting in one of the mansion's
gardens, in the middle of a sleepless night for
both of them, during which they exchange dead spouse stories. Then, a two-person sunrise
hike up a mountain, which results in Alim divulging to Feyi that he had a male potential life partner whom he felt obligated to give up,
because his then-college-aged children (Nasir and Nasir's younger
sister Lorraine) couldn't accept him being with a man. On that
mountaintop, they share a hug initiated by Feyi that lasts a little too long.
Then, a spark of brazen impulsivity where Feyi licks mango foam off of
Alim's fingers in his private test kitchen, which both shocks and arouses him
(confirming for Feyi that he wants her too). Then, Alim being visibly
moved by
Feyi's art exhibit—which centers around losing her husband like
much of her work does—and dedicating a dish to her journey of grief during
the multi-course dinner he's prepared, for the surprise celebration
party that Nasir organized. Then, after Feyi's time on the island
gets extended due to a new commission, and almost immediately after
Nasir leaves for a week-long work trip to another island, a lesson in julienning
carrots switches into Alim and Feyi passionately kissing in the mansion's
main kitchen. (Alim kisses her first.) And then, after so many heart-to-hearts
that it's almost overkill, this younger woman and older man
decide that they want to explore what their new
love could become at all costs. They make each other feel so much less alone in their
grief, that they're willing to risk Nasir and Lorraine hating them for the opportunity of a real relationship together.
Before I address why this novel made my head spin, let me make clear that I adored You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty
immediately upon starting it, and I adore it still. Take as proof the
note I wrote in my journal when I passed the novel's halfway point in
mid-August: "I really do love this book. The prose is so vivid and alive
and full of texture/sensation/feeling. Emezi is so brilliant at
balancing horniness ('desire') and grief, two very distinct forms of
yearning. What a unique 'romance novel' this is." And I was endlessly
intrigued by Emezi's choice not to name the island that Nasir and Alim call home; maybe readers who are from the Caribbean
or have Caribbean heritage would be able to intimate which island it is, but for me it was a fun guessing game that had me looking at
countless maps and googling my butt off! (We know for sure it's not
Trinidad, Tobago, or Antigua, each of
which are referred to as islands that are elsewhere. The mention of
monkeys seems to
narrow it down to Saint Kitts and Nevis, Sint Maarten/Saint Martin, or
Barbados. On the other hand, when Alim cooks lionfish for Feyi's celebration dinner, he
mentions that it's an invasive species in that island's waters, which
made me think of Curaçao. But the island is also described as being a
short flight from Antigua, so Curaçao couldn't be it. There's also a conversation where a museum security guard asks, "oui?" at the end of a sentence to
confirm that Feyi understands what he's saying. So I'm going to guess,
assuming that Nasir and Alim's island is a place that exists in real
life, that it's Sint Maarten/Saint Martin, which has mountains, monkeys,
lionfish, and French as one of the official languages. Obviously I
could be wrong!)
Now for the head spinning. When Fool of Death
was first making its rounds and receiving an immense amount of
attention and acclaim, I tried to avoid any details because I knew I wanted to experience it for myself. One sentiment that filtered through and has
continued filtering through ever since the book's 2022 publication is how
"messy" it is, and how messy Feyi is in particular. But having
previously gotten familiar with Queenie from Queenie and Edie from Luster,
I aimed to be open-minded and stay on Feyi's side. Call it
protectiveness or morbid curiosity, but when it comes to these Black
women characters in their
20s who are (or perceived as) unlikeable and making outlandish
decisions, I want to hug them and try to figure them out more than I want to judge them. And for most of Fool of Death I sincerely was
on Feyi's side; it's so obvious that
she's going to act on her attraction to Alim despite knowing she
shouldn't, so why bother being moralistic about it? Let her get hers!
Plus, even though Nasir has a right to be upset with her for betraying him—they were never
officially an item, but Feyi still crosses the bounds of friendship and hospitality by
getting with his dad—his discomfort with Alim's gender expression and refusal to support Alim's previous gay relationship reduced my sympathy for him early on. Furthermore, as salacious
as it seems, Feyi and Alim do make sense. They're
both artists who respect each other's expertise. They've both been
widowed by tragic accidents (Alim's wife drowned), and both understand the rupture of such a destabilizing
loss. They've both been in relationships with their same gender that
didn't or couldn't work out. (Feyi had a temporary fling with Joy in the
past, and she describes her mountaintop moment with Alim as "the most
bisexual conversation," but neither of them explicitly claim a label to
describe their orientations.) If, say, Nasir is the fruit, then Alim is the
source of that fruit, so theoretically Feyi would get
more of what she enjoys about Nasir by going straight to the source. And
unlike with Nasir, she doesn't need extra coaxing, convincing, or mulling over to decide that she fancies his father.
My perspective shifted when I reached Lorraine's confrontation with Alim in the mansion library, after
the whole island (including Nasir) has found out about him and Feyi,
with Lorraine being the voice of reason that her father refuses to yield
to. In my head, when Alim was just a composed silver fox in touch with his feminine side, kissing and pillow-talking with Feyi, his
obstinance about choosing
her (choosing himself) over his kids almost made
sense. But when he was a dad trying to placate his daughter while committing to not changing anything about his actions, I—as a fellow daughter with father issues—read him and his explanations in a completely different light. He even has the nerve to argue that him hurting his children with his choice doesn't make his choice wrong. Theoretically true though that idea may be, it still sounds selfish and unhinged in this context! And Feyi, as she
eavesdrops on the discussion and gets internally indignant on his
behalf, sounds selfish and unhinged too! That entire scene is what made
me go, Wait... is this narcissism? I
know that term gets batted around to the point of meaninglessness on
social media. Yet and still, the more I read Feyi and Alim past their initial
coupling—especially when they're in a position to have to defend
said coupling—the less I saw them as sultry and daring and the more I
saw
them as... yeah, maybe narcissistic is the word.
So I'm conflicted about Feyi. It could be the in-mourning of it all, the lust of it all, the summertime tropical fairy tale
of it all, the stereotypical
Nigerian arrogance and dramatics of it all (or so I've heard), the "I'm an artist and I'm sensitive about my sh*t" of it all (in the words of Erykah Badu), or the
potential narcissism of it all, but Feyi doesn't truly care
beyond what she wants; all else is secondary. She's a prime
example of
someone who doesn't necessarily try to hurt people, but who's still out
for number one
(herself) at the end of the day. At least twice she
expresses a belief that nothing
really matters, and she frequently repeats the sentiment that being reckless makes her
feel alive. Feyi is also chronically self-absorbed, even in her
insecurities: constantly fretting over never belonging anywhere, feeling
like an imposter as an artist, fearing that she's not good enough for
Alim or worthy of a future with him, etc. And when she does contemplate how her decisions might impact others,
her concern is largely about how she'll be perceived, the inconvenience of dealing with those people being upset, or how they'll make her feel like a bad person. This results in multiple instances where one would normally be expected to be remorseful or at least a little apologetic, and she becomes defensive and self-righteous instead, as if she's the injured party, frequently conflating her
self-righteousness with empowerment or feminism.
Even her eavesdropping on Lorraine and Alim is something she justifies
by reasoning that since she knows they're talking about her, waiting in her
room—which she'd initially volunteered to do out of respect for their privacy—equates to hiding, hiding
implies shame, and she doesn't want to be "a small girl" by cowering to
shame. But her putting a feminist spin on her ridiculousness is most evident in her later interactions with Nasir. (See: Sobbing that
Nasir treats her "like trash" when he rages at her about her involvement with Alim and scatters her belongings
while trying to kick her out of the mansion; taking irate offense at what she interprets as Nasir not respecting her as a woman or an artist when he causes a scene at
the museum in retaliation; feeling hurt and offended by the possibility that Nasir might think of
her as a gold-digging groupie, because that would supposedly be unfair to her, and
she believes Nasir should know her better than that based on all the delicate moments they'd shared.) I agree with Feyi that she doesn't owe
Nasir as much as he thinks she does, but the fact that his behavior toward and
opinion of her have changed so drastically as a direct consequence of her hurting him, someone she claimed to value as a friend, seems to go over her head. It's as if she thinks him being incensed at her and holding onto his anger is immature or irrational, which makes me feel like I'm crazy for understanding where that sustained anger is coming from. And I know I'm not crazy!
All in all, do Feyi and Alim give me the drama I paid for? Yes. Am I still scandalized by how they handle the fallout? Also yes. But
then I must ask myself: If we as progressive
people, thinkers, and readers say we want women (in real life and fiction) to be more
self-interested,
more unapologetic, more proactive in expressing their desires, more
audacious in going
after what they want, and more keen to prioritize their pleasure and
self-preservation... do we still mean that when the woman in question
acts the way Feyi does? And although I'm tempted to conclude that Feyi and Alim are terrible people, I've also never been in love, especially not
after the death of a spouse, and certainly not to the extent that I'd be
willing to forsake all else to take a chance on it. Maybe if I'd also experienced losing the love
of my life and believing for years that I'd never love again, until I
suddenly and all-consumingly fell for someone new, then I would
understand. Who's to say?
I purposely waited until this precise moment (the end of my process writing this review) to examine the reader's guide and Akwaeke Emezi interview at the
back of Fool of Death, in an attempt to ascertain where this author's head is
at. I figured, maybe they wrote these romantic leads to be so baffling, to be "wrong,"
on purpose, and doesn't necessarily think their approach is acceptable?
But now I know that, in addition to intentionally making Nasir and Alim's
island fictional and unintentionally leaving it nameless, Emezi doesn't regard Feyi and Alim's attitude or actions as unconscionable at all. Emezi admittedly
"loves mess," is fascinated by what people do when they put their own desires first, and is optimistic about the prospect of people becoming
sympathetic toward Feyi and Alim after reading their story. While I
can't say I'm completely aligned with Emezi's perspective on what they've written, I can say that I haven't had a book challenge me ethically or morally like this in very long time. Bravo! I'm a conflicted new fan, but a new fan nonetheless! (My best friend Marlee recently read
Emezi's debut novel Freshwater and came away from it with the same impression as me; we're mutually astounded by Emezi's writing prowess, but also can't help wondering about the person behind the project. In Marlee's
words, "You are [Emezi is] a person in a
moral grey area that I don't know what to do with." Then again, maybe we're simply too square to fully get on board with them. I'mma still read Little Rot though! Ordered my copy of that before I even finished Fool of Death.)
You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty calls to mind a separate conversation I had with Marlee early this year, about Kendrick Lamar's Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers
album, which didn't resonate very strongly with me when I listened to it upon
release. Two things made a world of difference: going through so much more life since that initial listen (including joining the 30+ club and weathering the death of a close loved one), and hearing the album with my 2025 ears in preparation for the Grand National Tour. Now Mr. Morale is one of my favorite Kendrick albums! Similarly, if I'd read Fool of Death when it first came out and
the hype was still fresh, I doubt that I would've been able to appreciate it back then. Now? As flummoxed as I am by Feyi and Alim's
lack of remorse, I get it. The horniness, the grief, the weight of
feeling unmoored for a prolonged period of time, the desperation to not
be alone, the willingness to fight to hold onto whatever or whoever
finally assuages your loneliness for the first time in ages? I
get it. And coincidentally, Mr. Morale and Fool of Death
were both released in May 2022! Ain't that something? If you're
interested in sexually free female characters, bisexual DILFs, forbidden romance, stories set in the Caribbean, life after loss, Black fine art (Emezi name-drops numerous Nigerian/Nigerian American/Black American artists), or fine cuisine (Emezi obviously did plenty of research on that too), then read this
book! If you're in the mood to read something equal parts gorgeous and vexing, then read this book!
Favorite quotes:
"I know she does [love me]. And that's something I've learned in the years since, that there are so many different types of love, so many ways someone can stay committed to you, stay in your life even if y'all aren't together, you know? And none of these ways are more important than the other" (118)."There were moments that broke timelines, that cut them so deep and so bloody that they would never stitch back together again, that the life before the cut was as dead as the person who was lost. Just memories through a haze of hurt" (130)."'He would've thought it was hilarious,' she said. 'He loved people being messy as fuck—he said it was one of the best things about being human, how we could make such disasters and recover from them enough to make them into stories later'" (184-85)."...but I can't change the circumstances that brought her to me, and with her, the possibility that my life could go in a direction I thought was closed off. And for this, this possibility? You're so young, baby girl, your whole life is still nothing but possibilities. You can't possibly know what it's like to lose it, and how much even a chance of its return is worth it to me" (236)."But then I see Alim. And he's smiling at me, and I don't understand why I'd throw the world over a cliff for him, but it's so clear, and every minute I'm with him, all those things drop off me like dead skin... I feel like the world wanted to remind me that it loves me, and so it gave me him. It gave me a chance, that possibility he's always talking about, and I seized it with both hands because I know, and Alim knows, how fucking rare it is for that door to open, even by a crack, and what it's like when it closes" (265).
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