Claiming Kin

Publishers Weekly

Researching her family history after the death of her father, Scruggs came across the following entry in a 19th-century Mississippi county assets census: "1 pair waffle irons, 2 washing tubs, one waggon (sic) one carriage, eleven plows, one grinding hoe Also the Following Negroes, viz Lynda and her children": it was there that she discovered her grandfather. This moving, beautifully written memoir charts Scruggs's uncovering of her family history and her own, as well as the resolution of her conflicted feelings about her critical, domineering parents and her awakening into a new spiritual life more closely associated with African traditions. In the process of weaving these three strands, Scruggs tells stories about her kin, including how her 15-year-old uncle was shot and killed by a white store owner. She can be ironic describing how in her 1960s Nashville childhood (she could not understand why the water in the fountain marked "coloredwater" looked no different from what was dispensed in other fountains ) or can simply convey her pain and confusion after discovering that she cannot buy an Afro-comb when she is studying Russian at Middlebury College in Vermont. After training for an academic career in Slavic languages, Scruggs ended up a journalist, and her search into her past triggers a calling (in the form of dreams) to African spiritual practice. With an ear finely attuned to language and emotions, and an investigative reporter's sense of driven narrative, Scruggs has written a book that explores and clarifies both the personal and the political. (Feb.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Short, lyrical segments record the author's attempts to discover her family's history after the death of her father. Children's author Scruggs (Jump, Rope, Magic, 2000; Journalism/Ohio Wesleyan Univ.) was 15 when her father died in 1980 of lung cancer. She had lost not only a beloved parent but also a priceless resource, she writes: "His death left me without his voice, his words, without the story of his life." In an investigation that led from relative to relative, from archive to archive, Scruggs attempted to recover the names and stories of people whose lives were shrouded in the wordless history of slavery and Reconstruction. The author grew up in Nashville, and we hear some about her childhood and her education. (She doesn't exactly come across as modest as she declares herself a "certified genius" and writes about her superior record as a student.) After a B.A. from Chicago and a Ph.D. in Slavic Linguistics from Brown, she decided an academic life was not for her and segued into journalism, where she has remained. At first in desultory fashion and then more systematically, Scruggs began interviewing family members and examining 19th-century property records, where she found the names of her ancestors. Soon, she was even consulting supernatural sources, interpreting dreams and consulting with experts in Nigerian deities and in the Spiritual Baptist movement. She found evidence of some extramarital hanky-panky a generation or so back and discovered the interracial nature of her history, meeting the white family whose ancestors once owned hers and gave it the Scruggs name. At the close, she realizes that all names, including her own, will eventually disappear into the fog of time.Divided into 20 chapters and 2 epilogues, her brief narrative is mostly non-linear, structured by emotion and memory rather than time; readers must relax and float on the subtle currents of her prose. A moving and engaging reminder that our stories define us.