Illustration by Sophie Kenyon Current, candid, and cutting. Candice Carty-Williams’ debut novel Queenie strides confidently between laugh-out-loud humour and perceptive social critique to fuse a hugely enjoyable storyline with challenging questions of identity and race.
Delivered in the honest voice of protagonist, Queenie Jenkins, a 25-year-old black Londoner coming to terms with a ‘break’ from her white boyfriend, Tom, the novel quickly builds a rapport with its reader through its openness, making the narrator seem more like a friend than a fictional character. From the opening sequence in which Queenie, legs separated in stirrups, discusses her miscarriage, the novel covers everything from circumcision to OkCupid with a refreshing frankness of opinion and emotion.
Plagued by the desire to be the fun-loving, energetic character that her friends expect, Queenie is unable to see the damage she is piling on herself. As her life falls apart brick by brick, the chatty catastrophist searches for a lifeline to help herself stay afloat, descending into a stream of sexual partners that objectify and exploit her, but offer the sense of validation that she feels she requires. Yet, as problems at work and in her friendships come to a peak, her obliviousness to the harm she is causing breeds a tender sympathy in the reader. The discord between narrator and narrative is navigated with tremendous skill, utilising the first-person speaker to highlight the power of subjectivity as Carty-Williams drops superbly subtle hints of deeper issues through a series of fragmentary flashbacks. Alongside her complexly crafted protagonist, Carty-Williams creates a stellar support cast of friends and family that leap from the page as fully-formed individuals. The core group of ‘Corgis’, to support this fictional Queen, are made up of the beautiful and blunt Kyazike, the self-important, psycho-analysing Cassandra, and the worktime-tea partner, Darcy. The women’s interactions, mainly conducted through a group chat—which mingles the traditional novel with the digital age, offer some of the funniest passages as Kyazike introduces Darcy to the Urban Dictionary and Cassandra is criticised for her perfect punctuation.
Queenie’s family provides just as much entertainment. From her penny-pinching grandfather to her social-media obsessed teenage cousin, Carty-Williams wryly explores the pressures and protection of a traditional Caribbean family and the morphing expectations of each generation. While the whole family offers Queenie support through her troubles, it is her relationship with her mother which provides the most touching moments. As they begin to reflect on the shared struggles that drove them apart, Carty-Williams laces scenes with tender emotion that offers hope of reconciliation without the gushiness of a Hollywood ending.
In addition to Queenie’s agonising yet darkly comic journey, Carty-Williams deftly addresses issues of racism which occur in everyday life. Through her fictional frame and outspoken narrator, Carty-Williams highlights racist incidents which all readers will have witnessed, from a woman approaching Queenie to feel her hair to the numerous admirers that reference her ‘chocolate’ skin, and explores the effects microaggressions such as these have on the individual. In doing so, she highlights the systemic racism which our society breeds, and holds a mirror up to those who allow such instances to occur.
As discussions of race and inequality spread through our society in the wake of the death of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests, Queenie offers a poignant, personal insight into racial discrimination and its consequences.
When this social critique is mixed with Carty-Williams’ wit and perception, the result is exceptional, making Queenie not only one of the most important books to read during the lockdown, but also one of the most enjoyable.