The Vanishing Half: A Novel

The Vanishing Half, published in June 2020, is the second novel by author Brit Bennett. It became a New York Times bestseller and was selected as a Good Morning America Book Club Pick. The novel explores the themes of female family bonds and the Black experience in America. Bennett covered similar material in her debut novel, The Mothers (2016), which also became a New York Times bestseller. HBO has purchased the film rights to The Vanishing Half with the intention of creating a limited TV series from the material. Page number citations in this guide refer to the Kindle edition.

The novel is set in several locations during different time periods. The story begins in the small village of Mallard, Louisiana, in 1968 and then skips to New Orleans, New York, Southern California, and back to Mallard between 1978 and the early 1980s. Just as the time and location shift among numerous places and decades, the limited third-person narrative point of view shifts among multiple people. Since the novel is driven by the perceptions and recollections of its characters, the story does not move in a linear fashion.

The plot concerns identical twins Desiree and Stella Vignes, who leave their small Louisiana village at the age of 16 to seek their fortune in New Orleans. Ten years later, their lives have diverged in radically different directions. Desiree has fled an abusive marriage to a Black man and brought her daughter back to Mallard, while Stella is passing for White, is married to a businessman, has a daughter with him, and lives in California.

Much of the novel recounts Desiree’s search for her missing twin and how that search is completed by Desiree’s daughter. In the process, the book explores the themes of how identity is constructed, the role that self-loathing plays in creating an alternate persona, and the social ostracism visited on those who are different from the norm in some way.

Plot Summary

Identical twins Desiree and Stella Vignes live in Mallard, Louisiana in a community of light-skinned Black people. The villagers are proud of their Caucasian features and coloring, and most of them could pass for White. The Vignes girls have big dreams for their futures. Flamboyant Desiree wants to become an actress, while quiet Stella wants to be a teacher. Their dreams are crushed by their mother, who forces them to leave school at the age of 16 and take jobs as maids to help make ends meet. In 1954, Desiree convinces Stella to run away to New Orleans in search of a better life.

Fourteen years later, Desiree drags herself back to Mallard accompanied by her dark-skinned daughter. They are fleeing Desiree’s abusive husband. In the meantime, Stella has abandoned Desiree to pass for White. She married a wealthy businessman, had a daughter with him, and moved to California. Stella never reveals her identity to anyone and makes no attempt to contact her birth family.

When Desiree’s daughter, Jude, reaches the age of 18, she accepts a college scholarship at UCLA and leaves Mallard. During her time in California, she accidentally catches a glimpse of Stella and meets Stella’s daughter, Kennedy. Jude becomes obsessed with confronting her aunt. In the process, she forms an unlikely bond with Kennedy as the two ponder the meaning of their kinship, even though they look radically different from one another. Because of Jude’s interference, Stella returns to Mallard to repair her broken relationship with her sister and her mother. After this reunion, she goes back to her White life in California, and she is never able to achieve a true sense of identity because her entire life is based on a fabrication.