The House of Plain Truth by Donna Hemans
There are some novels so moving they demand a place in your memory and heart long after you have read them and you may become an evangelist pressing copies on friends. The House of Plain Truth (Zibby Books) is one such book. The writer’s name may not yet be familiar to you but the voice of this author, Donna Hemans is eager to be heard and she has plenty of plain truth to tell in lush, lyrical prose.
Little wonder this Jamaica-born, Maryland-DC area-based author has been honored for her works as well as twice served as a Creative Writer in Residence at Georgetown University and has received several residential fellowships.
She often writes about fractured relationships; the fraught dynamics of familial interactions resulting from poor decisions, long-held secrets and lies that have inflicted pain, mistrust and an unwillingness to let go and forgive among the various surviving members. There is a longing for home, acceptance and redemption with the hope love will ultimately prevail.
Home is Where the Heart Is
The proverbial expression “home is where the heart is” has a number of meanings: an emotional or spiritual connection to one’s birthplace or country, peace and comfort found with those most loved, or a nostalgic wish to be where your fondest memories were made.
For Pearline, the protagonist and narrator of The House of Plain Truth, Jamaica is mecca and the family home is recalled as a sanctuary beckoning her to return. These are faulty memories inflated with warmth and love and held most dear despite her parents’ contentious relationship, lack of honest communication and disharmony.
After receiving a call that her elderly father is near death, the emotional tugs at her heartstrings compel her to suddenly and abruptly decide to return permanently to Jamaica. It is shockingly out of character as she had seldom returned to the island after leaving her parents and two sisters behind and emigrating to Brooklyn, New York as a student.
Pearline is 64 years old, exhausted physically and mentally by decades of working double shifts as a hospital nurse with extra work serving as a home health aide for elderly patients and volunteer hours with her church. She has scrimped, saved and invested to have a modest home in New York and to educate her daughter all the while enduring the harsh northern climate, racism and startling prejudice against Caribbean immigrants from USA-born African Americans.
Her incessant busyness has left her with little time for contemplation or to spend time with her estranged daughter Josette and her grandchildren. “Daddy’s girl” Josette was brokenhearted when he died of a stroke while Pearline was working one of her second jobs. Whether she truly blames her mother for not recognizing the stroke symptoms and caring for others more than her immediate family is moot and unaddressed. Her adult daughter Josette and grandchildren are stunned by her departure but she doesn’t think they will really care.
Search to Uncover Family Secrets
The year is now 1993, sixty years after her parents, Rupert and Irene, defeated and desperately poor, returned home to Jamaica after a lengthy failed attempt to gain wealth in Cuba enticed by deceptive advertising for workers. They were accompanied by their offspring Aileen, age 7 and Pearline, age 4 leaving their eldest daughter Anna and sons David and Gerardo behind. Their middle son and scholar Arturo died in one of the many uprisings in Cuba and was buried there. Irene nearly gives birth to baby Hermina on board ship.
Upon their return, bitterness between the couple escalates with decades-long simmering resentments, deceits and scarcely suppressed anger. Rupert and Irene did remain married until her death. They never forgave each other nor revealed their secrets, disappointments and hidden sorrows to the children.
Upon their return, they somehow acquired a little land, some cattle and a small country house where trees and vegetation planted failed to thrive, perhaps sensing the bitterness between the couple.
Pearline arrives in time to nurse her grumbling, obstreperous and fabulist father in the few weeks before his death. Her sisters are present when he names his children; something he has not done since they left Cuba in 1933. For 60 years, he only talked about these three daughters refusing to acknowledge he had other children. Papa’s last words whispered to Pearline were: “Find them for me… you are my memory now.”
This sacred promise becomes her all-encompassing mission regardless of her sisters Aileen and Hermina’s approval or assistance. The House of Plain Truth yields its secrets slowly with many shocking revelations as the story begins to unfold in the compelling and original voice of the author.
A Historical Portrait of Jamaica
Jamaica, the Caribbean’s third largest island, has a complex, troubled history of a country long dominated by foreign powers. Columbus discovered this island paradise on his second voyage to the new world in 1494. By the time Great Britain captured Jamaica from Spain in 1645, the indigenous Arawak population had been eliminated and slavery introduced with captives from Africa.
Pirates frequented the island in the latter half of the 17th century. Spain formally ceded Jamaica to England in 1670 after which the island became a center for slave trading in the West Indies. The Royal Africa Company was formed in 1672 with Jamaica its primary marketplace.
By the 18th century, British settlers relied on slave labor to work sugarcane, cocoa, indigo and coffee plantations. The slave trade was abolished in 1807 but emancipation did not come to Jamaica until 1834. Contracted indentured Indian and Chinese workers replaced the slaves.
The island became a British Crown Colony in 1866 about the same time as banana production was introduced. Jamaica joined the Federation of the West Indies in 1958 with full self-government and was granted independence in 1962.
Living conditions on the island have ever presented an enormous dichotomy; a study in contrasts of dire poverty versus immense, almost unimaginable wealth and privilege. It has long been a playground for Hollywood celebrities, authors and genuine royalty offering stunning views, near-perfect weather, and in the times before drone photography, privacy.
Australian-born Errol Flynn first bought an estate there in the 1940’s. Noel Coward is buried in his remote island paradise, Firefly, renowned for its sweeping views and equally stunning guest list which included Queen Elizabeth II, Sir Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor among many others. This rather modest house is now a museum open to the public.
His nearest neighbor was Ian Fleming whose lavish home Goldeneye is now a resort villa. It served as his writing retreat as well as a place to entertain. Dr. No, the first movie in the James Bond franchise, was filmed on the island. While there remains a great disparity in wealth distribution, Jamaica does now have a comfortable middle class which included Pearline’s sisters Aileen and Hermina and their extended families.
Return to Author’s Roots
Time and again, Donna Hemans returns to her roots in Jamaica with the award-winning novels River Woman (2002) and Tea by the Sea (2020) as well as short stories and essays. The House of Plain Truth is a remarkable achievement with the universal appeal of a strong novel about difficult family relationships. In the right hands, it could be adapted for a great film or television series.
There is a rich literary tradition in Jamaica including the aforementioned British authors as well as many native-born islanders including Marlon James who won the Man Booker Prize in 2015 for A Brief History of Seven Killings, Nicole Dennis-Benn who is best known for her novel Patsy, and Jamaica-born and London resident Kei Miller’s whose Augustown has been named as a best book of the year by several publications among a very long list of other distinguished authors.
Visit the Caribbean via the books and become acquainted with some fine writers of literary fiction!
About Donna Hemans:
Donna Hemans is the author of the novels River Woman and Tea by the Sea. Her fiction and non-fiction have appeared in numerous literary magazines, including Slice, Shenandoah, Electric Literature, Ms. Magazine and Crab Orchard Review. She received her undergraduate degree in English and Media Studies from Fordham University and an MFA from American University. She lives in Maryland and is the owner of DC Writers Room, a co-working studio for writers.
