Having a slow dance with an off-key song
‘Made in Queens’ a south Queens Women’s March exhibit
Caribbean Life, MAY 14-20, 2021 31
By Terri Schlichenmeyer
It’s got a good beat.
The melody is fun, too; it
makes your body move, and
you’ve already caught yourself
singing along when you
hear it again. That song’s a
hit, but in the new novel, “The
Final Revival of Opal & Nev”
by Dawnie Walton, there’s still
something off-key about it.
For most of her life, Sunny
Curtis had “taken great pains
to conceal” what had happened
in 1970. It’s not that she was
embarrassed that her father
and Opal Jewel had an affair
– he was beaten to death at
the Rivington Showcase, she
never even knew him – she
just preferred to make her own
mark. But after she became
the first Black editor-in-chief
at Aural magazine, Curtis realized
that there was her chance
to do something she couldn’t
do before.
She reached out to Opal and
Nev.
Nev Charles had grown up
in Birmingham, England, and
was a tall, geeky, red-headed
14-year-old the year he started
Book cover of “The Final Revival of Opan & Nev” by Dawnie
Walton.
writing songs for the Boys from
Birmingham, a small-time,
local band. It didn’t take long
for his talents to eclipse theirs
and soon enough, Nev moved
to New York to find fame. Rivington
Records signed him but
owner Howie Kelly wanted Nev
to have a female singing partner.
Together, they found Opal
in Detroit.
She was “ugly,” skinny and
bald, and the truth was that
her sister, Peggy, was supposed
to have the singing career,
but Peggy went and married
a Pastor in Birmingham, Alabama.
It was just before that
when Nev and Howie saw Opal
behind Peggy at an open mic
event. She was wearing a gold
dress and moving, and Nev
knew Opal was it.
Everybody always thought
he was in love with her, but
he seemed a little scared of
her, too. Opal didn’t suffer
fools. She stood up for herself,
with words or all-out war, and
she was almost fearless but
she could be impulsive. That
impulsivity was part of why
Sunny Curtis’s father died, and
it almost killed Opal’s career…
Reading “The Final Revival
of Opal & Nev” is like driving
down the road with the
radio on: most of the time,
everything’s fine but sometimes,
you have bad reception
and you can’t quite understand
the content. Two miles (or two
pages) later, everything’s good
again.
You might blame that on
this novel’s “interview” style.
Author Dawnie Walton lets
Sunny do the bridge narration
– be sure to start reading with
the “editor’s note” – and other
characters weigh in as the tale
progresses. That‘s an interesting
method of storytelling, but
it can skip like a broken record
or a corrupted file, and can be
just as annoying.
And yet—
Readers who deep–dive into
the music scene, who love
immersing themselves in an
album, or who relish a complicated
novel with a decadeslong
arc will love this one. It’s
quite slow, but the culmination
is heart-pounding and the
ending will rip your heart out.
If a novel like that sounds like
a song to you, then “The Final
Revival of Opal & Nev” can’t
be beat.
“The Final Revival of
Opan & Nev” by Dawnie
Walton
c.2021, 37Ink
$27.00 / $36.00
Canada, 361 pages
Final Revival of Opal & Nev author, Dawnie Walton. Rayon Richards
By Tangerine Clarke
The South Queens Women’s
March (SQWM) will hold the
opening night of its inaugural
art exhibition “Made in Queens”
in Jamaica, Queens, on Saturday,
May 15, from 4 pm – 7 pm.
The invitation only launch,
will feature a brief program,
and open to the press, at King
Manor Museum, 150-03 Jamaica
Ave., Jamaica Queens (located
inside Rufus King Park).
“Made in Queens” will welcome
the public from May 16
through Sept. 15 at the King
Manor Museum, the former
home of Rufus King, a framer
and signer of the United States
Constitution.
To view the exhibit, members
of the public must book a reservation
for a tour of the exhibit
through the King Manor Museum
website at https://www.
kingmanor.org/reservations.
According to the group,
“Made in Queens” is SQWM’s
attempt to decolonize the art
that we consume. The organization
is doing so by hosting its
own exhibit highlighting local
BIPOC artists “representing
the REAL Queens, New York.”
According to SQWM, for a long
time, those with access, means
and money have determined
what is valuable in our society,
especially when it comes to art.
The least represented groups
in the art world are BIPOC, and
more specifically, are women
of color and gender expansive
people.
“South Queens Women’s
March was founded to celebrate
the resilience of women,
girls and gender-fluid people
in our community in spite of
the struggles we continue to
experience. We exist to connect
women, girls and genderfluid
people with the tools they
need to thrive. This includes
access to the arts. For too long,
access has been cost-prohibitive
and not reflective of our actual
communities.
‘We’ve made it a point to
use art as a catalyst for social
and political change, and as
part of healing in our work
to curb gender-based violence.
Our team has worked tirelessly
to bring this offering to our
beloved Queens,” said Aminta
Kilawan-Narine, founder and
director of South Queens Women’s
March.
Inspired by global and
national women’s rights movements,
the South Queens
Women’s March amplifies the
voices of South Queens’ diverse
women. SQWM is an all-volunteer
multi-generational, intersectional
platform working to
foster women’s empowerment
through dismantling norms,
practices, and institutions that
support patriarchy and gender
injustice.
The organization has taken
to the streets to unify women
and gender non-conforming
individuals in the South Queens
community and provide them
with the tools and resources
necessary to empower their
own lives and thrive.
/www
/reservations
