Book Review: ‘Inside Rain’ by Monique Mensah

I don’t know where I first met her. Perhaps it was the Mocha Monologues, down at the Signature Bar & Grille, West Jefferson, down from Hart Plaza, under the bridge, near the water; or perhaps I met her at the Breakfast & Books event with Rev. Horace Sheffield, when she sat next to me and we briefly discussed James Baldwin and the state of black literature. I don’t know, but I knew there was something precocious and careful and meticulous and ominous about her eyes. They looked right through me like two uninvited mystic crescent moons investigating the very depths of my soul.

Any author who dare go beneath the surface of our humanity in efforts of a deeper examination of that which makes us who we truly are is certainly a courageous person. Not since Baldwin, then with Capote’s In Cold Blood, and Robert Goolrick’s raw neurotic memoir, The End of the World as We Know It – (and let us not forget the rather ambitious attempt by Detroit artist Janaya Black with her latest novel, Beautiful Rage) – have we gotten the kind of brave and courageous literary leaps and bounds that were once the order of the day, (a nostalgic glimpse of Harlem’s finest moment). Nowadays, writers are preoccupied with the vanity and glamour of having their name scrolled on a book-cover, rather than study the craft, learn the mode, and produce a good piece of literature. The current state of black literature reminds me of something Goolrick said about attending cocktail parties:

I don’t like cocktail parties. While they may be proof that matter can, in fact, be created out of nothing, they are an enormous amount of trouble to give, and almost invariably a chore to attend. They are rarely given for a reason; they just happen to come along once in a while. Nothing of substance is ever said, it is all about a façade of charm and gaiety, about showing off new clothes, trying out new anecdotes, presenting a falsely socialized version of yourself. People give them and, I suppose go to them, in a state of generosity and hopefulness and, once they end, they are hardly a memory to put in the scrapbook.

So, as a matter of course, I found myself disenchanted, repulsed, and put off by the very thing that I once felt obligated to promote and support. Then I ran into Mensah at the Virgil Carr Center where she handed me a review copy of her new novel,Inside Rain. It had sparked new interest in my once waning faith that black lit will save the race.

Let’s load this down: Rain bears witness to the killing of her mother, which, in turn, leaves her in a catatonic state of being. Loked-out, spellbound, and on her way to total insanity, Rain is anymore sure of her reality than what she saw the night of her mother’s death…. That’s about as much as I can tell you without giving away the plot to this otherwise pretzel-twisted design of a beautifully demented story (which is really about the power of love…and its ambiguous meaning).  It is also about childhood trauma and how one little girl deals with the death of her mother. All the right stuff is mixed up in this bitches brew of kinky sex, lesbians, nicely delivered in pure psychotic drama: the story has verve, spunk and will certainly cater to those interested in the naughty, insane and the perverted.

Life imitates art (and vice versa), and Rain symbolizes something more than what we could’ve imagine. Mensah is good at what she does, but she is wicked at what she conceals.  Her writing is decent, and her ability to handle trauma is impressive. But there is something missing here… and I’m not sure if I know what it is. I think the answer may lay in those falcated moonbeams.

5/5