What We Lose
First edition (US)
AuthorZinzi Clemmons
LanguageEnglish
PublisherViking (US)
Fourth Estate (UK)
Publication date
July 11, 2017
Pages277
ISBN978-1-4328-4641-1

What We Lose is the 2017 debut novel of American author Zinzi Clemmons. It is loosely based on her own experiences caring for her mother who was dying of cancer.

Background

Clemmons was a graduate student in the fiction MFA program at Columbia University, working on a novel, when her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. She finished her degree but set aside the novel, instead writing journals of her experiences caring for and ultimately grieving her mother's death. These became the basis of a more experimental project than her unfinished linear novel, a fragmentary and chronologically disrupted "exercise in autofiction".[1]

Plot

Thandi, the daughter of a South African mother and an American father, comes of age in Pennsylvania. When she is in college, her mother is stricken by cancer and dies, causing Thandi's life to fall apart as she struggles to process her grief.

Shortly thereafter, Thandi discovers she is pregnant by her boyfriend Peter. She decides to carry the pregnancy to term and has a son she names Mahpee. She and Peter quickly marry and he moves to New York City to be with her and their child. However their marriage quickly falls apart and after she cheats on him, she decides to ask for a separation.

Thandi begins to forget her mother and slowly begins to heal, though she realizes her mother's death will haunt her for the rest of her life.

Style

In The Guardian, Marta Bausells described What We Lose as "highly experimental, told in intimate vignettes including blogposts, photos, hand-drawn charts and hip-hop lyrics".[2] In Vogue, Megan O'Grady notes the book's "boldly innovative and frankly sexual" style, noting "the collage-like novel mixes hand-drawn charts, archival photographs, rap lyrics, sharp disquisitions on the Mandelas and Oscar Pistorius, and singular meditations on racism’s brutal intimacies."[3] O'Grady compared Clemmons to authors like Karl Ove Knausgaard, Meghan O’Rourke, and Claudia Rankine.[3]

Clemmons cites Toni Morrison's 1970 first novel The Bluest Eye as a significant influence for What We Lose.[3]

Reception

What We Lose received overwhelmingly positive reviews.[1][3][4][5] The New York Times review said: "The book’s distinctive form and voice give it an unusual capacity to show how individuals connect deep feeling to broad political understanding — an experience too rarely rendered in fiction."[6] The Guardian called "a debut of haunting fragments".[7] The Telegraph praised it as an "Intelligently and impressively conceived, and beautifully told" novel.[8]

Awards for What We Lose
Year Award Result Ref.
2018 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Debut Novel Finalist [9]
2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Fiction Longlist [10]
2017 Goodreads Choice Award for Debut Goodreads Author Finalist [11]
2018 Aspen Words Literary Prize Shortlist [12]

References

  1. 1 2 Weiss-Meyer, Amy (August 1, 2017). "'What We Lose' Is a Striking Debut Novel About Familial Loss". The Atlantic. Retrieved May 9, 2018.
  2. ↑ Bausells, Marta (August 10, 2017). "Zinzi Clemmons on her first novel: 'I'm proud of it, because I didn't hold anything back'". The Guardian. Retrieved January 13, 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 4 O'Grady, Megan (July 20, 2017). "Zinzi Clemmons Has Written the Debut Novel of the Year". Vogue. Retrieved May 9, 2018.
  4. ↑ French, Agatha (July 20, 2017). "Debut novelist Zinzi Clemmons is frank and experimental in 'What We Lose'". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved May 9, 2018.
  5. ↑ Crosley, Sloane (July 18, 2017). "What to Read Right Now: Al Gore's An Inconvenient Sequel, Zinzi Clemmons's Powerful Debut, and More". Vanity Fair. Retrieved May 9, 2018.
  6. ↑ Ganeshananthan, V.V. (September 8, 2017). "Stories of Familial Unrest and Displacement". The New York Times. Retrieved January 14, 2018.
  7. ↑ Kola, FT (August 5, 2017). "What We Lose by Zinzi Clemmons review – a debut of haunting fragments". The Guardian. Retrieved January 14, 2018.
  8. ↑ Scholes, Lucy (July 12, 2017). "What We Lose by Zinzi Clemmons, book review: a story about identity organised around the momentous loss of a parent". Independent.co.uk. Retrieved January 14, 2018.
  9. ↑ Murua, James (July 4, 2018). "Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Awards 2018 nominees announced". James Murua's Literature Blog. Retrieved March 2, 2022.
  10. ↑ "2018 Winners". Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction. Reference & User Services Association (RUSA). October 19, 2020. Retrieved March 2, 2022.
  11. ↑ "What We Lose". Goodreads. Retrieved March 2, 2022.
  12. ↑ Weisman, Jonathan (March 6, 2018). "Awards: CWA Diamond Dagger; Aspen Words Shortlist". Shelf Awareness. Retrieved March 1, 2022.
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