Two Hurricanes: Family Secrets Surface in the Wake of Katrina in “Behind the Waterline” https://ift.tt/qzpOnVH
Kionna Walker LeMalle transports us to New Orleans in Behind the Waterline to show us how floodwaters don’t just expose the pipes and studs inside of walls — they can expose family secrets, too. This winner of the Lee Smith Novel Prize brings us through the historic storm, from a pre-Katrina New Orleans to a city in recovery. But its exploration of racism, the Civil Rights movement, found families, and coming-of-age, all with a touch of magical realism, make it a story with depth greater than the highest water line.
LeMalle grounds the story in her young protagonist, Eric Calhoun. Complete with an entourage of high school antagonists and protagonists, he’s an insecure teenager that wouldn’t be out of place in Stranger Things. Deepening the cringe is his relationship with his grandmother, Ruth, who everyone else thinks is crazy. She appears very angry with the world, and keeps Eric sheltered from it. When Eric is given an assignment to write a legend of a family member, he hesitates. His mother is dead. He never knew his father. His grandmother doesn’t let anyone in the house except for Pastor Charles. The only legendary part of Eric’s life is his grandmother’s chicken salad.
With this assignment in back of his mind, Hurricane Katrina comes ashore. LeMalle gives a tragic, though very accurate depiction of what this storm did to small communities in the city, despite it only landing a glancing blow. During this terrifying event Eric discovers something strange about his closet. He witnesses a room filled with memorabilia from the Civil Rights era and a half-faced man saying things like “Let the baby cry… At least he’s woke. We all need to wake up.” It’s puzzling enough to write off as a dream, though its impact on Eric is greater than that of the storm.
In the chapters that follow, the story wades through the flood waters, rescue and evacuation to Houston, and new housing for Eric and his grandmother. New characters pepper the pages, which gives the book a down-home connection amidst the chaos of the storm’s aftermath. But the longer the pair stay away from New Orleans, the more the story hidden away in the closet starts to feel as if it was lost to the flood like everything else. Ruth’s erratic behavior is the only thing that ties us back to Eric’s life before evacuation. She shows typical trauma responses when in the back of a taxi that seems too much like a police car. Her reactions when the social worker tries to verify her guardianship show someone who has had to protect family before. It all seems connected, though Eric cannot figure out how.
So many stories of the storm focus on how it tormented people and how it changed their sense of home. This book says those things are important, but survivors of tragedies such as this are bigger than their home, bigger than just one story. Eric’s visions show him his whole family was part of an attempt to integrate Ole Miss University. His search for the truth in his closet brings him face to face with his lost father, the past his grandmother hid from him, and the racism she tried to shield him from. As each of them face what happened, both during and after the storm, they become new people, built back better like the Calhouns’ house after the storm. In the closing pages, Pastor Charles captures it all, saying,
We been so busy over the years burying the past we never really allowed ourselves to build a future. So I guess what I want to say is, somehow, we got it all wrong. This storm story isn’t just about renewal. It’s about facing what is behind us so we understand who is walking into the future.
The ending is a gale. It’s as if the story is bookended by two hurricanes. The truths, revelations, and resolutions come flying about quickly in the last forty pages. It’s almost hard to keep up with them. But they all have big feels. From a heartbreaking realization about a parent, to a sweet sought-after engagement, LeMalle ends the story in the eye of an emotional hurricane. It hits stronger and deeper than her depiction of the storm itself, and may be what LeMalle wanted to show us: as devastating as a hurricane can be, nothing can stop the formidable force of our secrets, our deepest desires, and what letting them out might change us into.
FICTION Behind the Waterline
By Kionna Walker LeMalle
Blair Press
Published March 25, 2025
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