Dancing Between The Raindrops: A Daughter's Reflections On Love And Loss

by Lisa Braxton

A powerful meditation on grief, a deeply personal mosaic of a daughter's remembrances of beautiful, challenging and heartbreaking moments of life with her family. It speaks to anyone who has lost a loved one and is trying to navigate the world without them while coming to terms with complicated emotions. Lisa Braxton's parents died within two years of each other-her mother from ovarian cancer, her father from prostate cancer. While caring for her mother she was stunned to find out that she, herself, had a life-threatening illness—breast cancer. In this intimate, lyrical memoir-in-essays, Lisa Braxton takes us to the core of her loss and extends a lifeline of comfort to anyone who needs to be reminded that in their grief they are not alone.

151 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 7, 2024

About the author

Lisa Braxton is the author of the memoir, Dancing Between the Raindrops: A Daughter’s Reflections on Love and Loss, published by Sea Crow Press. Her novel, The Talking Drum, published by Inanna Publications, is the winner of an Independent Publisher (IPPY) Book Awards Gold Medal and an Outstanding Literary Award from the National Association of Black Journalists. She is on the executive board of the Writers Room of Boston, and a writing instructor at Grub Street Boston. serves as President of the Greater Boston Section of the National Council of Negro Women and is a member of Psi Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.

Reviews

[Book Reviewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dancing Between The Raindrops: A Daughter's Reflections On Love And Loss by Lisa Braxton is the memoir of Lisa’s family, the love and joy throughout the years as well as the hardships, challenges, grief, and loss that come with being a part of a union as strong as the nuclear family. In this book, Lisa reminisces on her being a painfully shy child growing up in Connecticut, her mother’s writing talent and aspirations, becoming aware of and dealing with racism from a young age, taking care of and losing both parents to cancer as well as dealing with breast cancer herself, and so much more. This heartfelt book is a reflection and an homage to the beauty of life and being human, the basic human needs, emotions, and desires, and the fact that the good and the bad are both essential parts of life.

Lisa writes in a beautiful tone, expressing undeniable gratitude and love towards her family members on each page of the book. Her honesty and raw emotions are what set her work apart from similar memoirs. Reading this piece felt like a lifelong friend sitting down for a coffee and telling me about all the stuff I’ve missed out on from the last time we saw each other. It deals with a lot of sensitive topics, including taking care of an elderly parent when they most need you, grief from losing a loved one, and being discriminated against on a racial level, to name a few.

Each chapter being a story of its own makes the book and its message even more powerful and real. One of the stories that touched me the most early on in the book was one of Lisa’s first times dealing with racism in school. Someone had told the African-American kids to go back to where they came from, and just reading about the way Lisa felt at that moment was heartbreaking. She explains that she felt confused because, yes, she has African ancestry, but how can she go back to a place she had never been to? Furthermore, her parents and grandparents were all born and lived in the U.S. The confusion in that little girl’s mind is something that will stick with me as a reader for a long time.

I highly recommend Lisa Braxton's Dancing Between The Raindrops: A Daughter's Reflections On Love And Loss to anyone looking for a poignant and touching memoir. The book is a heartwarming tribute to the universal experience of love and loss.

[Bev · Rating 5 out of 5]

(Please note: I received a free copy in exchange for my honest review.)

My Review:

The subtitle of Lisa Braxton’s memoir accurately describes the purpose of her book – ” A Daughter’s reflection on love and loss.” She shares with us in much detail, memories of the past. She lost both parents within two years of each other – her mother in 2020 and her father in 2022.

I would also add to this – she gives us a very honest account of the racism she and her family experienced, from her parents in the Jim Crow era to hers in school and in later years. Chapter 3: “Welcome to the Neighborhood” was very poignant. She describes what her parents wanted for their daughters: “They didn’t want us to be held back by people who used race as a means of control and disrespect.”

The format of Ms. Braxton’s memoir is fascinating. Most chapters were essays, filled with memories from different times in her family’s life, often moving from present to past and back to present.

But there were other chapters that presented a different way to share memories (and provided a unique way to highlight hard truths):

poems she has written (my 2 favourites: Chap.17 “Wishbone” and Chap. 29″A Better Life”)
a playlist – with memories for each song (as she says , memories are linked to songs)
a press release
news scripts
even an ad – for a Comforter in Chief.
We learn how her mother championed her, even leaving a letter for her to show how much she was loved.

I highly recommend Lisa Braxton’s memoir, Dancing Between the Raindrops. I thoroughly enjoyed her writing and her history. This is a loving tribute to her parents and offers reflections on grief, on loss, on love.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a moving tribute to the author's father (and mother) that is written in an unusual format of essays, poems, etc. However, the essay format that was inclusive of essays of different dates meant that there was some repetition of information already presented. Nevertheless, I was glad that I read this memoir. Since I am writing this review some time after I read this book, I can only remember that my overall perspective was positive and that this book was worth reading.