Book Review: Wander In The Dark by Jumata Emill

Half-brothers Amir and Marcel Trudeau have never really gotten along. When restaurateur Martin Trudeau left his first wife Monica to marry his pregnant mistress Lily, the seeds were planted for a sibling rivalry that would last almost two decades. However misguidedly, Amir and Marcel grew up feeling that they had to compete for their father’s affection and love. 

Only the recent death of their Nana was able to shake this dynamic. As Marcel explains:

Nana, our grandmother, used to say Amir and our father are so much alike. Both stubborn. Unwilling to do the work and meet each other halfway to fix their relationship.

 

That’s where I come in. Nana said if anyone can bring our family together it’s me. “You my little busybody,” she said once. “Just nosy and eager to be in charge, make everyone feel better. That’s special. You’re special.” On her deathbed, she made me promise that I’d do what she never could. God rest her soul. I’m taking charge and bridging the divide in our family.

 

To do that, we all have to start dealing in truths and not the skewed versions of it we’ve allowed ourselves to believe.

Since then, Marcel has been trying his best to reach out to his older brother. He’d hoped that being at the same school would help, after Amir transfers in to New Orleans’ prestigious Truman Academy in his senior year. But Amir does his best to avoid Marcel, even declining to attend his big Mardi Gras birthday party.

Enter Chloe Danvers, the hot white girl who happens to be one of Marcel’s best friends. She sends Amir a flirtatious message, saying she wants to get to know him better at the party. Amir can’t resist that kind of invitation, and is intrigued enough by smart, sexy Chloe to follow her home afterward. She confesses that she wasn’t actually trying to get into his pants, but doesn’t want to be alone in her house while the rest of her family is out of town. Amir is happy enough to keep her platonic company, smoking weed with her and playing Truth Or Dare before falling asleep on her couch. So it’s a total nightmare for him when he wakes up later that night to find her viciously stabbed to death in her bed.

Amir is swiftly arrested for Chloe’s murder. Marcel soon finds himself his brother’s number one advocate, steadfastly believing in Amir’s innocence and going so far as to investigate in an attempt to clear Amir’s name. Despite Amir’s discomfort at the amount of time this forces them to spend together, he can’t help but be slowly won over, even if the brothers have wildly different world views:

“You’re privileged, Marcel!” I shout. “Privileged to live in your bougie bubble where you don’t have to think about race or worry about anyone thinking less of you. You have money. The status. They’ve accepted you.”

 

“They who?”

 

“White people! Your friends. This world, them, they don’t see you the way they see me,” I say, stabbing myself in the chest with my finger. 

 

“So what are you saying?” he says. “That because I haven’t struggled, I’m not Black enough? Why does everything about the Black experience in this country have to be about struggling?”

 

“Because for most of us, it is.”

This kind of social consciousness serves to ground the proceedings in realism as the brothers learn how to truly be a family, while figuring out who really murdered Chloe and hopefully saving Amir from prison as well. Full of contemporary issues that affect so many young people today, this cleverly plotted, excellently characterized tale told from both brother’s viewpoints feels like it could be ripped from the headlines. Amir and Marcel each have their struggles growing up Black in America, but Jumata Emill makes it clear that they’re not in some sort of misery Olympics. What’s important, as Wander In The Dark so perfectly depicts, is that solidarity and the truth work hand in hand to make life better for everyone, and that the guilty face up to and take accountability for their crimes, no matter how big or small.