Fiona's Book Club
with Fiona Frawley

Synopsis

• The Song of Solomon: An extract from a longer book by Toni Morrison in which two Black men discuss The Seven Days, an organisation that kills white people in retaliation for the racial killing of Black people. One of the men, Milkman, is part of the organisation, and explains to his friend Guitar why it needs to exist.
• The Bluest Eye: Another extract from a Toni Morrison book that tells the story of Pecola, a child who has to move in with her neighbours after her Father burns their family house down. The first chapter from this book is is written from Claudia's perspective, one of the children from the house Pecola moves to. She doesn't understand why her peers love Shirley Temple, or why she should be grateful for having white baby dolls to play with. In the next section, Pecola meets Junior, the son of a light skinned Black woman who doesn't want him mixing with other Black children. He locks Pecola in a closet and throws the family cat (who his Mother loves more than him) in her face.
• Beloved: A chapter from the novel Beloved. Sethe, a formerly enslaved woman, lives with her daughter Denver and the ghost of her other daughter, beloved. Paul D, a man who was enslaved on the same plantation comes to their house and wishes to start a relationship with Sethe. Sethe tells him the story of how she escaped the plantation, and about the ghost of her daughter.
• Recitatif: A short story about two young girls, one Black and one white, who grow up together in an orphanage. They meet a number of times as adults, but are divided by race, class and a disagreement over a memory from their childhood.
• Making America White Again: An essay by Toni Morrison. She discusses racism in America, historically and at this point in time, with a particular focus on Donald Trump.