Ghost house

In Helen Oyeyemi’s third novel, home isn’t so sweet after all

By Celia C. Perez
Published: May 20th, 2009 | 3:40pm

Helen Oyeyemi, the 24-year-old English novelist, is not only talented, but incredibly prolific as she strikes again with her third novel in four years. Oyeyemi wrote her first book, The Icarus Girl, before graduating from high school. The story of a lonely biracial girl who finds companionship in a mischievous little girl (who may, or may not be, a figment of her imagination), was soon followed by a second novel. In The Opposite House, a Cuban-born and London-raised black woman, Maja, struggles with her sense of identity. The daughter of a woman who practices Santeria, a religion that melds Catholic and West African beliefs, and an academic father who doesn’t, Maja is torn between cultures and languages.

In White is for Witching, Oyeyemi tips her hat to Henry James’ ghost classic, The Turn of the Screw. She combines James’ looming mansion inhabited by strange, lonely children, malevolent spirits, and unsuspecting housekeepers with her recurring themes of racial and cultural identity to make for a novel that is suspenseful from start to finish. The ability to mix contemporary issues with haunted houses and spirits, and the folklore and myths of Africa and the Caribbean, are Oyeyemi’s trademark and make this modern-day ghost story her own.

After a mental breakdown in the wake of her mother’s death, Miranda Silver returns to the family-run bed and breakfast she calls home. Oyeyemi once again draws on her affinity for the supernatural, anthropomorphizing the house as a sort of soucouyant, a vampire-like creature from Caribbean folklore, draining Miranda of life. The house appears to have a mind of its own, manipulating its inhabitants for its own interests.

There is a lot going on in this novel. The themes of racial and ethnic tension, nationalism and sexual identity bubble below the story of Miranda’s decline, and it feels like Oyeyemi only scratches the surface of these, perhaps shrouding them in symbolism too much. Nevertheless, Oyeyemi has a way of weaving the supernatural into a modern world, where individuals struggle with issues of identity and place, to create a deliciously suspenseful tale. Her writing evokes a gothic eeriness where one fears the blatant, if imaginary, things that go bump in the night, while the real horror, unnamed, can appear to be less harmful than it truly is.

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ABOUT THE BOOK
White is for Witching: A Novel (Nan A. Talese)
By: Helen Oyeyemi
240 pages, $25.00