that people face every day, as her mostly African-
American female protagonists deal with issues of
racism, sexism, and poverty. Moreover, she writes
fables that reflect her Christian ethic. She told the
Washington Post: “I’m a Christian. That’s all I am.
If it came down to Christianity and writing, I’d let
writing go. God is bigger than a book” (Wiltz, 1).
These basic themes serve as the template for
her fiction. A Piece of Mine collects 12 stories that
focus on how women overcome abusive or loveless
relationships with men. Homemade Love features
13 tales in which characters enumerate the choices
they have made to find, keep, and support love
in their lives—some successfully, some not. Some
Soul to Keep is a collection of five longer pieces
in which Cooper discusses the highs and lows of
black womanhood, from the joys and difficulties
of being a wife and mother to learning how to
deal with loneliness. In The Matter Is Life, Coo-
per weaves eight tales that pay close attention to
the choices that people make when dealing with
the uncertainties of life. Her first novel, Family, is
a close examination of the physical, mental, and
spiritual effects of slavery, as a ghost-mother nar-
rator, Clora, watches the pursuits of her children
and their descendents from slavery to emancipa-
tion. Cooper’s second novel, In Search of Satisfac-
tion, also picks up the subject of slavery and its
aftermath but is more fable-like, as Satan himself
watches over the missteps of half-sisters Ruth and
Yinyang. Cooper returns to theorizing about the
ins and outs of love with a collection of 10 tales
titled Some Love, Some Pain, Sometime, creating
protagonists who learn to love not only others but
themselves. Wake of the Wind (1998), Cooper’s
third novel, focuses on the lives of Lifee and Mor-
decai, a former slave couple working to build their
lives in the oppressive postbellum South. In The
Future Has a Past, Cooper writes stories that show
the harsh consequences of losing the sense of his-
tory, a history she sees as necessary for securing a
brighter future.
Cooper belongs to the great emergence of black
women writers that began in the 1970s. Like her
contemporaries, she has offered an intimate look
into the lives of African-American women. She
has received much acclaim for her narrative style,
which shows the cadences and folkways of black
women. Her use of first-person narrative with
characters who speak directly to the reader is one
of her hallmarks. Writer and critic TERRY MCMIL-
LAN says that Cooper’s narrative technique “give[s]
you the feeling that you’re sitting on the front
porch with the narrator, somewhere in the South;
it’s hot and humid, she’s snapping beans, you’re
holding the bowl and she’s giving you the inside
scoop on everybody” (23). Cooper employs nar-
rators that not only share stories (usually the tales
center around people other than the narrators) but
also offer their own take on the situations, reveal-
ing personal frailties, biases, or feelings. With this
approach, Cooper creates an intimacy between
the teller and the reader. Her style has been called
“folksy,” “down-home,” and “gossipy.” In “Down
That Lonesome Road” from Homemade Love, for
example, the character Bertha begins the story
about how she paired up her lonely cousin with
one of her widowed friends, saying: “First off, let
me let you know, I am not a gossip! Can’t stand em!
I’m known for that! I don’t tell nobody’s business... and I know everybody’s!” (141). The narrators
are not always the most knowledgeable, however,
nor do they always learn the moral Cooper weaves
in the tales. For instance, Nona, the narrator of
“Friends, Anyone?” in The Matter Is Life, bemoans
how her former husband and best friend have
“betrayed” her by marrying despite Nona’s admit-
ting to cheating on her husband, abandoning her
twin daughters because they are handicapped, and
manipulating friends and family for her own de-
sires. Like Hurston, Cooper provides context for
her tales: The teller is just as important as the story
itself, making Cooper a consummate storyteller
within the African-American tradition.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. “Shattering Family Myths.”
New s day, 27 January 1991, p. 23.
McMillan, Teri. “Life Goes On, and Don’t You Forget
It!” New York Times, 8 November 1987, p. 23.
Wiltz, Teresa. “The Writer Who Talks to Frogs.” Wash-
ington Post, 26 October 2000, c1.Stephanie Powell Hankerson118 Cooper, J. California