This story of a woman's quest for retribution for her dead mother's dashed dreams is
all about choices. Presented as a multigenerational story of betrayal and revenge, WHAT
YOU OWE ME is really a lengthy exploration of the lasting influence parents have on their
children, the necessity of dealing with one's past, and the concept of personal
responsibility.
Matriece Carter is a 30-something cosmetics executive haunted by her mother Hosanna's
ghost. On a mission to recoup the money her mother lost when cosmetics mogul Gilda
Rosenstein pulled out of their fledgling firm in the 1940s, Matriece is at a crossroads in
her own life. Torn between living a life that would please her mother and choosing her own
happiness, Matriece begins to examine her past relationship with her mother and how it
continues to shape her decisions. To her credit, author Campbell uses not only Matriece's
example but a full cast, ranging from an African-American, South Central teen to a
middle-aged, white Beverly Hills executive, to make her definitive comments on the
parent-child dynamic. Campbell's characters act out their childhood hang-ups in a variety
of compulsive and sometimes self-destructive ways, from gambling and drugs to depression
and anger.
The meditative tone of the novel allows its central message to come through clearly: how
you respond to your parents' example, whether in agreement or defiance, is your own
choice. This theme is perhaps best represented in the book's closing chapters, when the
former partners, Gilda and Hosanna, admit their true reasons for never facing the other
after the breakup. When each woman gives up the mantle of victim and takes onus for the
decisions she made, it is a watershed moment in terms of the book's theme.
Another theme is that of the universality of suffering. The early chapters recount the
relationship between Hosanna and Gilda as young hotel maids in late 1940s Los Angeles.
Both women were driven to Los Angeles by oppression --- Hosanna after cruel whites usurped
her family farm and Gilda after surviving Nazi death camps. Heavy-handed and obvious
comparisons of their plights are made both by the narrator and through the character's
dialogue. It is hard to understand how Gilda, who makes so many of the comparisons between
Blacks and Jews, ends their friendship and business on the understanding that having a
Black friend will improve her life. One can only assume that this is the author's
intention, to impart the bewilderment that goes along with such an unexpected and
unfathomable turn of events. More interesting are the contemplations on race relations in
the contemporary portion of the story. Matriece's relationship with Blair, a white woman
raised in South Central, is a tense affair that Campbell uses to flesh out many of the
questions that affect people daily in a divisive yet politically correct society. Some
readers will identify strongly with these questions.
The looming troubles of WHAT YOU OWE ME's various characters, whether legal or personal,
are played out in a fairly tense manner. Although all of the characters receive a somewhat
happy ending, no one in WHAT YOU OWE ME gets a free ride; the resolutions are satisfactory
without being sappy. In the end, most of the characters have to stop running, look their
demons in the eye and take responsibility for their own lives.
--- Reviewed by Sofrina Hinton
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