Cane River

Cane River (2001) is a fictionalized version of the lives of author Lalita Tademy’s female ancestors over the course of four generations. The story stretches all the way back to 1834, beginning with Tademy’s great-great-great-great grandmother, a woman who was born into slavery, living on a plantation off the Cane River in Louisiana. Tademy uses her own imaginings to supplement her meticulous research into her family’s past. In writing the book, she traveled back and forth from her home in California to Louisiana where she interviewed family members and local historians and pored over old letters, census records, and other documentation. The novel includes copies of her family tree and photographs of the real women behind her characters.

The story begins with Suzette, born a slave in 1821 at Rosedew Plantation where she works in the kitchen alongside her mother, Elisabeth. Elisabeth, the matriarch of the family, was born in Virginia but was forced to move, leaving behind the two sons she had had by her master there when she was sold to the French creole Derbannes family in Louisiana. Suzette also serves as a personal companion to the Derbannes’ niece, Oreline. In that role, Suzette is able to catch glimpses of what her life could be like as a free woman. She fantasizes about someday becoming literate and perhaps marrying a free man of color. Both Suzette and her mother have high hopes for her future until one day when Suzette is thirteen, she is raped by a visiting white man named Eugene Daurat. As a result of this, Suzette gives birth to two children, a son and a daughter, named Gerent and Philomene.

Following the death of Rosedew’s master, Oreline buys Philomene and brings her to live with Oreline and her husband on their farm, splitting up Suzette’s family. Philomene draws the attention of white creole planter Narcisse Fredieu when, following an illness, she claims she has experienced visions of the future, which she refers to as “glimpsings.” Philomene convinces Narcisse—who has had two childless marriages thus far—that she has a true gift, telling him that he will never be able to have children with any woman but her. Narcisse believes her, and she becomes the mother of his so-called “side family.” Narcisse is particularly taken with Emily, the beautiful daughter he and Philomene have together. After the Civil War, Narcisse grants Philomene and their children some land on which they build a cabin. While the family still struggles to make a life for itself in a racist society, Philomene believes in the possibility of a brighter future for Emily, who is given some education in the form of a year at a convent school in New Orleans.



Emily falls in love with Narcisse’s cousin, a Frenchman and a wealthy white farmer named Joseph Billes. They have several children and live together as a family even though interracial marriage is still outlawed in Louisiana. Threatened with violence and social ostracism, Joseph eventually capitulates to pressure from the racist community and marries a white woman. While Joseph still makes an effort to provide for Emily and her children, Emily is left fighting to protect her children from the “Night Riders,” a gang terrorizing central Louisiana and threatening journalists who report their crimes with violence. Ultimately, the real-life Emily dies an old woman in her bed in the summer of 1936—twelve years before Tademy’s birth—with thirteen hundred dollars hidden under her mattress. Tademy grows up hearing stories about the beauty and elegance of her great-grandmother (called ‘Tite’ because it rhymes with ‘sweet’), which ultimately drives her to research further into her family’s history. One aspect of Emily’s personality that troubles her, and that she addresses at length in the book, is her colorism—or her preference for lighter skinned individuals who can “pass” as white. The skin color bias leads Tademy to have conflicted feelings regarding the memory of her great-grandmother, whom she still admired for the incredible resilience she displayed in her life.

Cane River was a New York Times bestseller and was selected for Oprah’s Book Club. Lalita Tademy went on to write two other works of historical fiction called Red River and Citizens Creek, but before Cane River, she was not a professional writer. Tademy left her career as the vice-president of computer company Sun Microsystems to begin research on what would become her first novel. The book has also enjoyed a positive critical response. It was called “bold, breathtaking, and unforgettable” by Essence magazine and “a long-overdue response to Alex Haley’s Roots” by the San Francisco Chronicle. Cane River was re-released as a mass market paperback in 2005 by Warner Books.