Passing & Quicksand

A light-skinned African-American woman Clare, an old childhood friend of Irene Redfield's, is now ""passing"" as a White woman.

Clare is married to a bigoted White man who is unaware that she is of African descent.

Despite the risk of being discovered by her husband and society at large, she is compelled to enter Irene's world. ... On multiple levels, Passing is a fascinating listening experience. Helga Crane aspires to be more than she is, to experience the world more deeply.

As a result, she ignores her hometown of Chicago, New York's Harlem, and even Copenhagen.

She also misses out on chances to be a part of a larger family, to marry, and to find true love.

What is always lurking in this absolutely excellent work is how much Helga's malaise is defined by the background of 1920s American racial segregation, and how much is - paradoxically - of her own doing...

Living in a society with so many unsolved issues, injustice, hypocrisy, and violence may very easily feel like wading in quicksand.