Trouble the Water

by Melvin Dixon

Trouble the Water moves among finely woven layers of time and place as it takes on a new and controversial theme in contemporary black writing, the search for family reconciliation. Twenty years after running away from home in Pee Dee, North Carolina, Jordan Henry believed he had found success, as a young college professor of history, a married man, and a resident of New England, whose colonial past he knew so well. When Jordan finds his career stymied by local prejudices, his world crumbles. Word of his grandmother's death reaches him, and he returns home to claim the ambiguous legacy of her farmland and face the consequences of his long absence.

Jordan's estranged father also returns to Pee Dee on a quest of his own restoring his good name in a community which blames him for Chloe Henry's death in childbirth. Chloe was Jordan's mother and his grandmother's only child. Unresolved hostility in the family and in the community breaks out, making Jordan the unsuspecting pawn in a plot of revenge against his father. Jordan may be the only one who can free his family from the past and the equally troubled present.

Trouble the Water gains resonance from its unflinching confrontation with dualities common in the Afro-American reality and myth, folklore and sophistication, North and South, rural and cosmopolitan. While sacrificing none of its complexities for the sake of simplicity, it has the relentless movement of a fairy tale that reaches deep into the unconscious roots of behavior. It is intensely lyrical and dense in realism. Trouble the Water is magical in the way it reveals the Afro-American psyche and symbolizes fundamental truths about American life.

Genres: Fiction, African American

243 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1989

Reviews

[Melinda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book that has been on my bookshelf for years. Trouble in the Water is an interesting book. The author paints a picture of mid century Louisiana when there were many rural people who still believed in the Zillie’s of the world and their magic and their haints Over the years I’ve read a number of books with similar plots which serve as enjoyable ways to learn about an entire other culture. One of the most interesting stories in the novel was the population represented by Jordan who was from that culture but not of the culture. Along with Jordan, his wife, Phyllis, hailing from Boston’s Black upper class who also learned about the life Jordan was born into but was as foreign to him as it was to Phyllis. The author did an excellent job showing that Black culture is not a monolithic life which many people today still don’t understand. I think the book would be an excellent way to open people’s minds and learn about the different experiences one can have within Black life.

[Raquel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dixon's power as a poet is evident in this lyrical and atmospheric novel. There is more unsaid than said on these pages, so it probably warrants a second read. Some of the threads of the narrative didn't quite interweave for me, and things felt perhaps a bit too neatly resolved at the end (Jordan does not seem to truly reckon with the father who abandoned him, which deflates some of the potential for power the ending held), but it was a moving story. I'm interested to read more of Dixon's work; he was garnering comparisons to other great Black American writers when his life was cut tragically short by AIDS. 💔

[Anissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve probably had this book sitting in my bookshelf for at least 20 years. Well written, interesting, well drawn characters. There were several different storylines that were followed and they weren’t always tied together very strongly. And sometimes I was just a little perplexed—there might have been some magical realism going on.

[Weckea · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's an incredible piece of literature. Reminded me of my youth.

[Marie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not terribly sympathetic characters; African-American man returns to the south of his childhood to confront his past.