4.5 — This book is so well-crafted, so beautiful... The author navigated the complexities of race relations over several generations, love/hate/indifference/conditionality within family, and the varying ways women’s independence can look... She brilliantly handled the nuances of passing — the choice, the need, the actions, the psychology, the impact — as related both to race and to gender, and she did so with a delicate and deliberate hand. Such a smart book.

Recommended reading: Passing by Nella Larson