Benny and Byron's family fell apart one Thanksgiving. Benny lives her authentic life in NYC, leaving her family on the west coast to move on with their lives without her. Byron is angry when Benny doesn't even show up for their father's funeral. Benny was planning on calling her Ma back; there was something in her voice in that last voicemail. Unfortunately, she would never get the chance because she gets the call that it's too late. Her mother is gone, but she left a video message for her and Byron.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Black cake masterfully blends perspective, past, and present to tell the story of a group of islanders from the Caribbean tied together through love, schemes, murder, secrets, and black cake. This story spans the globe from the island to the UK, Canada, and the United States.

Some of my most vivid memories revolve around family recipes, so this book really touched my heart. This book will bring your most delicious family memories gathered in the kitchen to the surface. Wilkerson is a skilled storyteller, with so many branches of the tale, I couldn't put it down until I found out what happened to everyone.

Black Cake is a book that started with an ending, a death, to give us a story of family, love, culture and allows us to soak it all in like the rum Black Cake of it's Caribbean heritage. It's an unexpected story that will have you following along the life of Eleanor as she tells it to her living children after her death.

Benny and Byron are two estranged siblings that end up coming together after the death of their mother, Eleanor. The last time these two spoke was before their father died over 5 years ago. They were once close as children, but they grew apart and made vastly different choices about their lives. Now, with their mother telling her the story of her life, they are forced to listen and put together the pieces of her life in order to understand their past and where they go with their future.

The beginning of the book took me a bit to get into and understand it. This is a story told in multiple POVs in short chapters, so you have to pay attention. Once you get past the first quarter of the story, the timelines and the people become more clear. You will be sitting with Benny and Byron and following along on the journey of their mother's past. And it isn't pretty. It's heartbreaking and filled with choices no one should ever have to make for the sake of their livelihood. It's a story of the Caribbean, European influences, racial differences, family, creating an identity and culture that is so ripe with food and the importance of the Black Cake within her family.

Between the heartbreaking story of Eleanor's life that she shares with her children after her death, to her finding a happiness she thought she lost, at the core of this story is love. Love for her children. Love for her husband. Love for her life. But there are many layers to her story that not even her husband knew. And her children and her friend are left to pull it all together.

I commend Charmaine Wilkerson for taking such a difficult story and making it something that is beautiful and moving. Eleanor was a powerful woman that had choices taken away from her, but even in death, her children found peace and love with what she left them. The strength and resilience that woman had to have to survive every day was something that she instilled in her children whether they realized it or not.

If you're interested in a story that is rich in culture and can appreciate a story that goes back and forth between POVs and timelines, this is a book you should definitely check out. I want to discover more with who Eleanor left behind and I would love to try her Black Cake as it became a very important "character" throughout. Because at the end of the day....'untold stories shape people's lives, both when they are withheld and when they are revealed.'

On its face, Black Cake is a multigenerational family drama about two siblings learning for the first time of their mother’s history. However, it’s much more than that, exploring rich Caribbean tradition, complex relationships, survival, friendship, food, and the sea. Without giving too much away, this book really hit its stride around the 25% mark and I was hooked from then on. However, the beginning was a bit complex and slow for me. By the end of this book, I felt compelled to explore my own family history and record my traditions. And of course, I want to try the titular Black Cake. I absolutely loved these characters and this story will stick with me for a long time.

Just finished reading this book and I really enjoyed it. The story was very interesting and it all wrapped up well. There were a few spots where it bogged down a little, but just for a short time. I found myself looking forward to having time to read during the day, and not just at my usual bedtime! Thank you NetGalley for opportunity to read this.

* Received a copy for review.* Although the writing is good, the story structure made this a tough one for me to finish.
The story is a good one but there are some unnecessary extra story lines that took away from the heart of this book.
This book will be a hot with some but it was just not what I had hoped it would be.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC of this beautifully written debut novel Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson.

Byron and Benny are estranged siblings brought back together after the death of their mother Eleanor. Eleanor leaves behind a voice recording which explains her upbringing and takes her children on a journey from the Caribbean, to London, and to California. Byron and Benny thought they knew their mother and the whole history behind her famous black cake. They had no idea the life she lived before they were born and discovering her past will help them to understand more about their own history.

I loved getting to know the characters in this book. The chapters alternated between the past and present quite a bit, but I never had a hard time keeping up. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys reading about families lost and found, secrets, and overcoming obstacles.

I know it's very early in the year, but I think it's safe to say that this will be one of my top books of 2022. And what a fantastic debut this was for Charmaine Wilkerson! The characters we are introduced to at the very beginning of this story are much different people by the end due to the events that we see unfold and it felt very seamless. The author does an amazing job of telling stories pertaining to each character that ties into the bigger picture.

Lots of heartbreak was felt through the story with hard topics such as rape and family hardships that really drove home to Benny and Byron, the children of the main character, that their parents faced many challenges to help their kids get to the level of success they find themselves at in the present time. We find out early on in the story that Benny hasn't spoken to her mother in almost 8 years after speaking her truth to her parents at Thanksgiving and it is so heartbreaking to see what occurred during their time of separation that would have brought the characters back together sooner. I also enjoyed the undertones of climate change the author included in this story and I think it ties in well to current day climate changes that we see transpiring.

Fans of shorter chapters in regards to remaining engaged within the story will be happy to know that most chapters only spanned one to two pages, which I found to be wonderful! I look forward to seeing who they cast for the upcoming Hulu show. If you get the opportunity to read this story, don't hesitate!

Estranged siblings Benny & Byron come together after the death of their mother, Eleanor Bennett, for the inheritance she left them = a voice recording and traditional Black Cake. Told during multiple time periods, you get a front row seat to the secrets Benny & Byron are hearing for the first time as well as a beautifully and heartbreakingly descriptive story of Eleanor's life she escaped and recreated for herself. Between the beauty of this heartbreaking story is also the unraveling of multiple mysteries and plot twists. There were so many layers to unpack and so much history to breath in on the choices that were made and the challenges that were faced - ultimately shaping not only the matriarch of the family but generations to come. I was deeply moved by this stunning debut.

Shout out to Charmaine Wilkerson for her first novel Black Cake. I absolutely adored the format in which this book was written. Benny and Byron are siblings who have not seen each other in years, but are brought back together to listen to a voice recording their mother has left for them. Through this recording they learn things about their mothers past that they never knew.

In the book, Benny is defined by her sexual preference and unorthodox choices she makes. Byron is defined by his color. Their mother Covey, is a runaway bride accused of murder. She must leave her country, her family and change her name to save herself from the man her father sold her to.

This story has so much depth. It is about, family, culture, identity, abandonment, sexual abuse, acceptance, secrets, flawed people, but most important it is about love. Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine Books for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I received this book from the publisher through netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book! I can see why Oprah has already acquired the rights to this and is supposed to be creating a Hulu show based on it.

After their mother dies Byron and Benny, estranged siblings, are brought together to listen to an audio that their mother insists they listen to together in the presence of her lawyer. In it she tells them the story of her past, and shares secrets that no one, not even her husband knew.

This story is steeped in history, mysteries and racial injustices. It is perfectly blended, intriguing, and lyrical. I was instantly captivated by the story and the intricacies of families. The petty grievances that keep people apart, the injustices we tolerate because we don't think we deserve better or don't want to rock the boat. The violence against women and the reality of men taking away a woman's power over and over.

I can't say enough about this book. As someone who grew up surrounded by Caribbean culture I can hear their lyrical voices, understand their traditions and was captured by the sounds of the sea. Do yourself a favor and add this to your reading list.

This was an incredibly heart wrenching generational family story. The character development was incredible. I felt like I was part of the family dissecting everything going on.

I also loved the back and forth timeline and how everyone’s story fit so seamlessly together.

i felt like this story was longer than it needed to be. If it was more condensed with less characters i would have enjoyed it a lot more.

I enjoyed this book immensely. The writing was excellent, the plot was engrossing. I found myself wanting to go visit this Caribbean island, just to get closer to the characters in the book, they were that real to me. I recommend it highly.

This debut novel from Wilkerson was such a great read. When Benny and Byron's mother dies, she leaves them instructions on how to go about her death. They realize throughout the process that they might not know as much about their mother as they thought. Wilkerson does a great job of weaving multiple characters and plot points together to create and interesting and powerful story of love, loss, and sacrifice.

I really wanted to love this book more then I did. It was incredibly slow paced. Normally I don’t mind that but a lot of the depth that should’ve been there felt missing. For example, how Marble couldn’t deal with meeting her new siblings and left immediately. Then it goes straight from her discussing things with her adoptive parents to being back with a month later with B&B. I would’ve liked to work through some of Marble’s emotions with her. Then I hardly found Byron likeable at all and I’m very familiar with people who become perfectionists who always do what they think their parents want, and I didn’t feel any of that normal turmoil with him. In fact, when it was chapters with his perspective, I almost liked him less and he seemed even more pretentious. Benny’s storyline was able to be the most connected with and was heartbreaking. Of course, Covey’s incredible story moved me as well. I think if I had connected to everyone instead of just half of them, I would’ve enjoyed this story much more.

A family drama that came out hot… and I was all in. And, then it fell flat on its face. It felt like the first bite a cake pulled out of the oven too soon. It lost me and quickly. Thanks to NetGalley for the early read.

Thank you to the author and to NetGalley for this ARC!

I love family dramas, and I found this one to feel very relatable and unique. First of all, the writing and pacing was so unique that I kept smirking at how clever the author is to introduce a character and then create short chapters immediately around them. The flow was different, and although I enjoyed it, I can understand that the pacing may not be for every reader.

I really liked Benny's character and the storylines from the past began to draw me in around 1/4 of the way through the book. To me, this is a book that I read and savored. It's not a story I binged but rather one that I would read and think about and come back to later.

I think this book will make a lot of Best Of 2022 lists and I'm excited to see what the author writes next.

This is a story inside lots of stories. A mom with so many secrets and only death can uncover them. There are a lot of characters in this book that all end up intertwining.

Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson is a rich, layered intergenerational spanning the Caribbean, England, and the U.S. Bryon and Benny, siblings estranged by time and circumstance, are brought together after the death of their mother to hear a recording of her life story and final wishes. The bulk of the story centers on Coventina, their mother, following her young adulthood, escape from undesirable conditions, and the incredible choices she has to make to keep herself safe. Wilkerson manages to give almost every character in the story a brief moment of voice, with each one feeling authentic and valuable to the story. There’s so much mystery and reveal in the unfolding of Coventina’s life, I found myself surprised along the way—which I hardly ever am while reading. Short, concise chapters keep the narrative moving, which has became one of my favorite styles to read.

At the heart of this book is the bonds of friends, community, and family—perhaps for Covey’s life, it comes specifically in that order. I really couldn’t put this one down and can’t wait to see it in the world. Every single moment of this book had me hooked. It’s the book I need to get me through my reading slump.

There isn't a lot left to be said that hasn't already been written in the hundreds of reviews available to read. This was a fantastic real by author Charmaine Wilkerson. A captivating story about family and discovering their own stories. I found this story engaging and propulsive, it was so much more than I expected and I'm so grateful to have received a copy for review. Thank you!