Black Rock by Amanda Smyth

I was very surprised to discover that Black Rock is a debut novel, for I consider it to be a highly impressive composition.  There is perhaps an echo of The Color Purple here, as Smyth’s heroine, ‘Celia’, has a quite similar name to that of Alice Walker’s protagonist, ‘Celie’, and she is also violated by a very unsavoury male relative.   However, taking inspiration from Alice Walker’s masterpiece ain’t no bad thing in my opinion, and besides, Celia’s voice is quite different from Celie’s, as Smyth’s heroine is far more educated than the latter (not that this prevents her from making some calamitous errors as she tries to find her place in the world).  Smyth’s setting is also quite different from Alice Walker’s, as Black Rock is set in Trinidad and Tobago rather than the Deep South.  Since Amanda Smyth is of Irish-Trinidadian descent, she is well placed to bring this locale alive.  Yet Amanda Smyth has commendably gone beyond her own experience to set Black Rock fifty years ago, to what would, on the surface, appear to be a much more ‘innocent’ time…  The few white characters in The Color Purple were physically and sexually violent to their black peers, so the whites in Black Rock seem rather more genteel in appearance, if still quite severe, when one considers the example of Joseph Carr Brown, who employs Celia’s aunt Sula on his plantation.  Ali Smith has compared Black Rock favourably with the works of Jean Rhys.  However, I’m afraid that Wild Sargasso Sea left me cold, and I’m pleased to report that I found Black Rock to be a far warmer and richer narrative than that of its illustrious predecessor, despite the various tribulations that Celia faces.  Celia is the result of the union between a white man from Southampton and a Tobagan woman, who died during childbirth.  Despite this, Celia has a moderately comfortable upbringing with her Aunt Tassi.  Unfortunately for Celia, Tassi has married a vile man, Roman, and it’s he who forces her to flee after he has violated her.  She escapes to Trinidad, and, falling into a fever on the boat, she is taken care of by the kindly (yet plain) young man, William.  As Celia’s fever takes hold, William’s mother shelters her and calls for the doctor, one Emmanuel Rodriguez, who will later take her into his employ, to look after the children that his depressive English wife has borne him, after the previous nanny mysteriously left him in the lurch…  As she is still a teenager, Celia still has a lot of growing up to do.  She often comes across as being quite self-centred (but then, who isn’t?).  And it is perhaps her hormones that lead her into developing a passion for someone who is very much the wrong man (although, maybe it’s genetics, as her older aunt Tassi also fell for the wrong man, in the form of the repugnant Roman).  Still, if things get too stressful for Celia, then she always has the escape route of visiting her aunt on the plantation.  So wrapped up is Celia in her own world and troubles, that she doesn’t begin to question why Joseph Carr Brown treats his employee with such respect, or to even ask what her job on the plantation is…  However, even this much-needed escape route would appear to be closing as her aunt falls desperately ill…  After having read the brilliant Black Rock, I’m not surprised to learn that the film options have been snapped up.  Since Amanda Smyth is writing the screenplay herself, I’m sure that any resulting movie will prove to be as excellent as the novel is, and just as classic as any of the movies that Celia herself sees throughout the book as a cover for her ongoing affair…