A Darker Shade of Crimson

Rating:
Summary: Disappointed expectations
Review: I picked this book up thinking I'd find nostalgic Cambridge ambiance, but it seemed more name-dropping than evocations of the real locales. Authors' credibility regarding academics also suffers because, among others, I've never heard of tenured faculty telling juniors to write papers for them (the more usual practice may be to get the prof's name ADDED as another author if research was done in her project/lab/funding). Author has a good diversity of characters and good sense of the oppressive academic politics they face while fighting over pennies, at an allegedly liberal university. Maybe that's a reason for the writing to be a bit thick, too. I find rather too much hasty action and happy coincidence than reflective deduction in this story. There's another mystery book I did like--oops, I can't recall its name--where the featured Harvard professor's degree in economics actually helps solve the crime. Author Thomas-Graham may learn that lovingly listing proud academic, etc., credits in her dj bio is the kiss of death for an aspiring popular writer in America (Aaron Elkins no longer does), perhaps by threatening the reader all sorts of -isms rather than skillful writing? or that the story is PC and you'd better like it?

Rating:
Summary: A Quick, Fun Read
Review: I ran to the bookstore to pick up a copy of Pamela Thomas-Graham's "A Darker Shade of Crimson" after hearing that it was about black people at Harvard. The book was a quick and fun read that highlighted issues of race, class, and gender in academia while at the same time providing an entertaining plot.

1-There were some inaccuracies in the book---such as a line mentioning "the collected works of William Junius Wilson" of whom I have never heard but who seems to be related to "William Julius Wilson."

2-The use of time was a bit ambiguous in the novel. At moments when I felt three weeks had gone by, she reminded me that only 2 days had gone by.

3-There was a bit too much name-dropping, to the point that I am not sure if people who haven't been to Ivy League schools would feel welcome to the book. I don't think I would.

4-Nikki Chase's relationship with Dante Rosario was not clear and/or believable; it was also annoying.

5-The politics of skin color came out well in the character dialogue of the story but Graham was less successful in handling it in the plot.

6-On a "moral" note I was left with the lesson that African Americans need to be excellent at what they do at all times. However, I decided that Nikki Chase was also someone I did not want to become--a woman working for "success" defined in terms of moving up a social hierarchy and getting approval from others. Success should be INWARDLY driven, determined, and evaluated. Thus, I feel like Nikki Chase is headed for therapy and a drastic mid-life crisis if she continues with the life perspective she has.

Besides all of that though I thought the plot was captivating. The ending for the murder plot was a bit slow and less dramatic than what I was suspecting. But the ending for the Leo-Ella connection plot was surprising. In addition, I found myself laughing out loud during some parts of the book. Most important, the commentary on the compexities of race, gender, and class in academia were informative without being preachy.

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick read and who has some interest in the black middle-class or Ivy League environments. Those who don't, I'd refer you to a different novel before I'd refer you to this one.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent book
Review: I was an economics major in college and I loved reading about a beautiful and smart african-american econ major! The Harvard setting was a bonus. I couldn't put the book down. I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: School is back in session!
Review: A severely lengthy novel, A DARKER SHADE OF CRIMSON deals with Nikki Chase, former Wall Street raider, now Harvard professor, who stumbles on the dead body of Rozella Fisher while finding her way down the emergency stairwell during a blackout in one of the halls. Nikki does some background history on her friend and finds out that she never had a degree, but she had a position in the finance department of the university. She had a connection with several major players on the campus that she kept to herself, and a disk that held several discrepencies between what was and wasn't counted with the school's budget. These contradictions and how they surrounded Rozella is what propels this mystery along. It's not enough that Nikki's former boyfriend, Dante, moves back into her life, but the fact that he is living in the same building makes it too close for comfort, adding the sexual tension. Again, the book is a long one, and the spaces between the mystery and the ex's can be a little too much at times, but it introduced a new mystery sleuth in a new atmosphere loaded with numerous cracks in the armor, hopefully bringing forth numerous stories.

Rating:
Summary: Important issues of race are handled very superficially
Review:

The heroine of this mystery, the first in a series of "Ivy League Mystery" stories planned by the author, is Veronica "Nikki" Chase, an African-American Assistant Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Harvard's campus is the principal setting for this story, which, in addition to being a whodunit, is intended to provide an inside look at the internecine politics of a college campus and the contemporary experiences of African-Americans within that milieu.

When Ella Fisher, another African-American woman who is the Dean of Students at Harvard Law School, dies in a fall down the stairs on the first day of the academic year, Nikki takes over the school budget figures that Ella has been analyzing for the Crimson Future Committee, a prestigious University committee to which both women have been appointed. Nikki discovers a discrepancy in one school's budget figures and tries to ascertain its source. Soon thereafter, a series of occurrences confirms Nikki's suspicion that Ella's death may not have been an accident.

Although this was a decent mystery, I was more intrigued by the prospect of seeing contemporary race relations played out in a college campus setting. I was disappointed in that aspect of the novel. The problem is that the author hints at some of the tensions, then backs down from any extended examination of these issues, much in the same way that Nikki backs down from a debate with white male and female faculty members over which are the great minds of Western literature that must be read by any educated person. Nikki objects to the short list of Plato, Virgil, Goethe, Kant that is sanctioned by her fellow academicians, citing its failure to include any literature created by blacks or women. However, the peremptory dismissal of her position by the others causes Nikki to break off the engagement out of concern for her career. I know that this is a legitimate fear and probable reaction for someone in Nikki's position, but without at least some exploration of the reasoning behind these statements, the characters seem superficial and even stereotyped.

As a result of the lack of in-depth analysis, Nikki's identity as black woman is not a very strong one. She never tells us anything about her family. Her closest friend is a white woman, a medical resident whose speech is supposed to be laced with the vocabulary of the hip-hop crowd. (To show her affinity with blacks?) Fortunately, this bit of chicanery is dropped later in the book. However, there is nothing else in the book which explains why the two women are close, and there is never any hint that race is ever an issue in their relationship. That's not the reality that I know. Interracial relationships are defined as much by what is said about the issue of race as by what is left unsaid. For the same reasons, it also isn't clear why Nikki is mesmerized by Dante Rosario, her fellow faculty member and former college sweetheart, who grew up in an Italian family from South Boston. She alludes more than a few times to his past emotional cruelty to her, is put off by his dates with white women (as well as a portrait of one that has been the centerpiece of his living room since their college days), and even confronts him with her beliefs that he is unwilling to have her meet his family or be seen with her in public because she is black. Her attraction to him remains overpowering in spite of all this. In contrast, when she decides to attend an important University dance in the company of a black law student, whom she feels is one "of the few successful black people at Harvard," she is immediately turned off when she notices that he is wearing red high-topped sneakers with his tuxedo. Later on in the evening, Nikki sees Rosario at the dance - in the company of a white woman, of course.

The relationships between other characters of different races also are contrived awkwardly in ways that do not bring any clarification to the reasons for their ambivalence toward one another. For example, Maggie Dailey, Nikki's black landlady, a woman whose promising career at Harvard was derailed by discrimination in the early 1960's, spends an entire afternoon joyfully preparing (with some assistance from Nikki) an elaborate dinner to welcome Dante and his roommate, Ted, as her new tenants. Then, during a brief period in the kitchen with Nikki during that meal, Maggie sternly and inexplicably admonishes her against "falling in love with some Italian man with a strange name. . . .he'll never take you seriously. He wants one thing from you, and once he gets it, he'll be gone again. That's all they ever want from us." This was the same advice given by Anita to Maria about Tony in "West Side Story", but that was within the context of a gang rivalry between the two ethnic groups.

"It's not about race," say Dante and the other faculty members in telling Nikki that they think that the values of Plato et al. transcend such boundaries and obviate any need to include black minds among their list of great thinkers. "It's not about race," Dante tells Nikki, when he explains why he broke off their relationship at an earlier time in their lives. Nikki allows these assertions, which we hear all too often, to slip by largely unchallenged, even in her own thoughts.

I would have preferred the author to have devoted more energy to fulfilling the promise implied by including a quote from W. E. B. DuBois ( "I was in Harvard, but not of it") and a lot less time on the Economics jargon. I have more than a passing acquaintance with Economics as a result of my undergraduate studies, but I did not find it to be an interesting aspect of Nikki's character or of the story. Her knowledge of Economics was not relevant to her resolution of the mystery to which she seeks an answer : "Why had two of the few successful black people at Harvard been struck down in the space of a week?" In the end, it is not the mystery, but rather the implication of Nikki's question - that not all blacks at Harvard are successful - that requires further elucidation in a book that chooses to make race a campus issue.

Rating:
Summary: A Quick, Fun Read
Review: I ran to the bookstore to pick up a copy of Pamela Thomas-Graham's "A Darker Shade of Crimson" after hearing that it was about black people at Harvard. The book was a quick and fun read that highlighted issues of race, class, and gender in academia while at the same time providing an entertaining plot.

1-There were some inaccuracies in the book---such as a line mentioning "the collected works of William Junius Wilson" of whom I have never heard but who seems to be related to "William Julius Wilson."

2-The use of time was a bit ambiguous in the novel. At moments when I felt three weeks had gone by, she reminded me that only 2 days had gone by.

3-There was a bit too much name-dropping, to the point that I am not sure if people who haven't been to Ivy League schools would feel welcome to the book. I don't think I would.

4-Nikki Chase's relationship with Dante Rosario was not clear and/or believable; it was also annoying.

5-The politics of skin color came out well in the character dialogue of the story but Graham was less successful in handling it in the plot.

6-On a "moral" note I was left with the lesson that African Americans need to be excellent at what they do at all times. However, I decided that Nikki Chase was also someone I did not want to become--a woman working for "success" defined in terms of moving up a social hierarchy and getting approval from others. Success should be INWARDLY driven, determined, and evaluated. Thus, I feel like Nikki Chase is headed for therapy and a drastic mid-life crisis if she continues with the life perspective she has.

Besides all of that though I thought the plot was captivating. The ending for the murder plot was a bit slow and less dramatic than what I was suspecting. But the ending for the Leo-Ella connection plot was surprising. In addition, I found myself laughing out loud during some parts of the book. Most important, the commentary on the compexities of race, gender, and class in academia were informative without being preachy.

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick read and who has some interest in the black middle-class or Ivy League environments. Those who don't, I'd refer you to a different novel before I'd refer you to this one.

Rating:
Summary: When the lights go out
Review: In this gripping mystery, Pamela Thomas Graham introduced the world to a new sister sleuth. Graham's characterizations are phenomenal, the writing is flawless, and the storyline is enthralling. I'd encourage anyone looking for a chilling mystery with a thick plot, set in an innovative location to check out A DARKER SHADE OF CRIMSON.

Reviewed by CandaceK
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers

Complete review can be found on our website...

Rating:
Summary: Unimaginative mystery, decent writing.
Review: Ms. Thomas-Graham did an admirable job for a first novel. I think it's too long by 100 pages and the "mystery" wasn't too dificult to figure out. [Without giving some things way, one immediately knew who was responsible for the budget discrepancies after the first 30 pages.] As for the death of Ella, if you've read enough mysteries, you could have figured that one out, as well. The writing isn't bad; it's breezy without being pedestrian and I learned a few new words. I think it's the plotting that's the problem: lots of useless information about characters; lots exposition about her specialty (economics) that don't move the story along, and several stereotypical characters (Maggie immediately comes to mind along with Isiah).

My central problem: How Nikki reacted every time she came in contact with Dante. It was distracting and unrealistic and in the end, it could have been cut completely from the book. I liked the insights into Harvard (such as they were), but most of those characters came off as stereotypes and nothing in their behavior (words or actions) provided any new or insightful information. As for the antagonist: didn't buy it at all.

At page 260, I jumped to the end because, by then, the story was essentially over. I went back and skimmed through the pages I didn't read and I didn't miss a thing. All that said, I'll read the next book in the series because one book doesn't give an author a chance. And while I think the character of Nikki is pretty bland, maybe the author will give her some "umph" in the next and subsequent books as she develops as a writer.

Rating:
Summary: Fresh breath of air
Review: In her debut novel, Graham introduces us to a feisty female professor. Nikki attended Harvard, majored in
business and went off to Wall Street to leave on her mark on the world. At 30 she is back on campus as a black professor teaching economics to starry eyed college kids with dreams she used hold close to her heart. When a colleague of hers, Rozella keeps a tumble down a flight of stairs during a power outage and
dies. The police write it off as a terrible accident. Nikki must finish writing a draft showing the financial needs for various departments for the next 10 yrs. As she goes to retrieve Rozella notes and files, she finds them missing. When she does have enough information to compare the data she finds serious discrepancy between totals for different departments. Nikki begins to investigate the accident and becomes an amateur
sleuth along the way. On the personal side she is trying to have a love life when her first love arrives back in her life. This part of the story was forced and not necessary. Graham wrote a strong mystery with a believable character and her next novel should show growth as a writer.

Rating:
Summary: How do you say too much hype?
Review: I wanted to hate this book. My petty cattiness wanted to pick this book apart due to the fact that the author is a glamorous, educated woman with the world at her feet. The green eyed monster aside, I found the book to be readable but not up to the hype that it has been given.

Veronica "Nikki" Chase stumbles over the body of a colleague after a blackout. She then becomes interested in finding out who did it, and why. Along the way there are ex husbands, implied affairs, scandals, and ex boyfriends. Did Pamela Thomas Griffin write this book with Writer's Digest 'Beginnings, Middles & Ends' open on her desk? This book was way too formalistic and predictable.

This section is a spoiler, so read only if you don't mind knowing how the book ends. My complaints: A) The best friend Jess. She was so corny, with her 'slang' laced talk. B) The ex-boyfriend, Dante. What was up with him? Was he the equivalent of a black man's blonde eyed trophy? Was he there so she could have a secondary plot? And since Nikki was so irresistible to every man she met, why would she let this guy push her buttons so? He was callous about her feelings, but it seemed that she spent the eight years he was away thinking only of him. C) The fact that Nikki decided to investigate. What was this - a bad episode of Charlie's Angels? There seemed to be no reason for Nikki to stick her nose into the business of Ella's death. I couldn't get find any motivation behind her search. The two had only just become friends at the time of her death, so there wasn't even any reason to suspect foul play. And less we not forget the tragic mulatto. For crying out loud, this is 2001! This passing issue could play about fifty years ago.

Some people seem to have an issue with the fact that Nikki had no close friends of color except Maggie. Since she was in Boston I found this to be credible.

I did enjoy reading about Harvard and the elite. Since I'll probably never be one of them, it was nice to get a peek at how the other half lives.

Borrow this book from a friend or the library. It is not one to own.