A book of ‘Blues’

In “Half-Blood Blues,” Esi Edugyan creates a vivid world of jazz music through an ensemble of characters finding freedom through the blue note. Before its March debut in the U.S., the novel first appeared in print overseas in 2011 and went on to become a Man Booker Prize finalist.

The novel begins in Paris circa 1940. Here, readers are introduced to the narrator, Sid Griffiths, one of the two black jazz members in the trio Hot Time Swingers. The remaining members include musicians Chip Jones, also black, and Hieronymus “Hiero” Falk, the young “half-blood” German with African roots.

There is a great deal of time that Edugyan covers throughout this book and plenty of historical events that bridge the distant past where we begin in 1940, with the more-recent past in the 1990s. Most specifically, two major historical events that are used in the novel include the German occupation in Paris during World War II in the 1940s and the fall of the Berlin Wall in the late 1980s, thus leading to reunification.

The setting allows readers to be transported back and forth from Paris to Berlin during tumultuous times when Europe and this band of musical brothers are undergoing subjugation from the Gestapo.

Through the differing time periods, readers are given two story lines. While Sid carries much of the narration in those stories, it is Hiero’s character that arguably creates the most interest for the characters and readers.

Even considering the varied locations, the narration remains in English. Readers may at times struggle with the language Edugyan writes for her characters, but, it is important to note that she molds the internal and external dialogue around their use of slang during that given era. The result of which comes across genuine and colorful.

“Couple hours before, we was playing in some back-alley studio trying to cut a record. A grim little room, more like a closet of ghosts than any joint for music, the cracked heaters lisping steam, empty bottles rolling all over the warped floor.”

The title of novel does not just resonate with Hiero but with all of the characters — those who are not defined by their race, but by their passion for music. In essence, that passion becomes a part of their identity.

There is a twist in the novel that initially seems unbelievable. But, by the end of the book, Edugyan proves her wit when she dives into the unfamiliar. She has led her readers through a story of music, love, mistakes and loss to conclude on a positive note with the trio breaking down their own barriers.