56 pages • 1 hour read
Naima CosterWhat's Mine and Yours
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Shared Tragedy
The book begins with a tragedy: Ray Gilbert is shot in front of his girlfriend Jade and her six-year-old son, Gee. The impact of Ray’s murder spreads beyond Jade and Gee, a ripple effect that touches the lives of Ray’s friend Robbie Ventura, Robbie’s wife, and his daughters.
Gee and Jade are the most immediately affected by Ray’s death. Gee grows up with faded memories of that terrible day, but without the guidance necessary to help him deal with the emotions that stem from what he witnessed and what he lost. Jade is determined to hide her own grief in order to protect her son from it, as she is afraid that if she reveals too much of her own emotion, it will cause rage to build inside of him and drive him to act out. Jade also wants Gee to know that the two of them can manage on their own and still build the life Ray wanted for them, one that does not include wallowing in their sorrow. However, Jade’s attempts to stifle their grief and push them both forward prevent Gee from learning how to cope. This carries into adulthood; adult Gee, now going by Nelson, is unable to support his wife, Noelle, when she has a miscarriage, as he has no frame of reference for how to healthily deal with grief and loss. Instead, Nelson seeks comfort in other women, and Noelle divorces him after she catches him in the act. Nelson and Jade’s story comes full circle at the end of the novel, when Nelson reconnects with his mother and they finally allow themselves to grieve for Ray together.
Robbie Ventura counts himself as one of Ray’s friends. Upon learning of Ray’s death, Robbie begins a downward spiral that leads to him developing a drug addiction and stealing a police car. Robbie is sent to prison, which leaves his wife, Lacey May, unable to support their three children. Robbie struggles with his addiction for the entirety of the book, repeatedly expressing a desire to recover and win his family back, but falling back into addiction and proving himself unreliable.
Lacey May never knew Ray, but his death affects her through Robbie’s actions. Lacey May cannot maintain the house Robbie purchased for her and their children by herself, and she struggles to care for her children while Robbie is in prison. Ultimately, Lacey May is forced to move in with, and eventually marry, a man she doesn’t love. At the same time, losing Robbie takes from the Ventura daughters the Latin culture that is their birthright, but which Lacey May chooses not to acknowledge. Later, Lacey May reveals her racist beliefs when she protests the integration of the city schools with the county schools. Ironically, Lacey May is protesting against allowing Gee into her daughter’s school, completely unaware that Ray and Robbie once dreamed of sending their children off to get a good education together.
By chance, Lacey May’s daughter—Noelle—crosses paths with Jade. They meet when Noelle goes to get an abortion at the clinic where Jade works, another instance of irony given that Jade also got pregnant as a teen. Feeling a bond with Jade, Noelle seeks out Gee at school, and they bond over their own secret tragedies—the abortion, for Noelle, and Ray’s murder, for Gee. Though the two eventually marry, the scars Ray’s death left on Gee cast a shadow over their relationship, and they are unable to cope together after Noelle’s miscarriage.
When the book began, there was hope in both Ray and Robbie. They talked about making a future for their children, buying homes in good neighborhoods in order to give them the best possible start in life. Ray’s murder took that hope away. Though Noelle and Gee still met, and still found the better life both their fathers wanted for them, their shared tragedies overshadowed their lives and altered their futures in inescapable ways.
Strong Women Fighting for Their Futures
This novel is filled with strong female characters, most notably mothers, who fight for their futures—whether that is a happy life with a loved one, a good future for a child, or simply peace with their own identity.
Jade is the first introduced. When the reader initially meets her, she appears to be an unhappy and unappreciative young mother who would rather be out living like other girls her age than caring for a child and a boyfriend. Jade reveals her softer side when she chooses to curb her anger and support Ray in his professional aspirations. After Ray is killed, Jade shows a deeper side of herself, proving that she is not the irresponsible young woman she initially appeared to be, but a woman whose life has been filled with disappointments and indifference, a woman who finally found a small piece of happiness only to have it ripped away in a senseless second of violence. In the aftermath of this unbelievable tragedy, Jade turns her focus on her child, determined to give him the life she was denied. Jade finishes school and works hard to provide for her son, becoming so focused on giving Gee a good life that she puts her own life on hold.
Lacey May is another mother who finds herself in an impossible situation when her husband goes to prison, leaving her alone with three children to feed. Lacey May has no work history and cannot find a job to pay her bills. For this reason, Lacey May is put in a position where she must choose between losing her children in order to be faithful to her husband, or to turn to another man to provide food and shelter for herself and her children. Just like Jade, Lacey May chooses to do what she has to do to provide for her children. In the end, Lacey May gives up her beloved husband, Robbie, for another man, Hank, with the understanding that Robbie cannot provide for her in the way Hank can.
Lacey May raises three girls who become strong women in their own right. Like their mother, they struggle through everyday situations that force them to find inner strength. Margarita wants to be famous, but she struggles with her looks and the competition in Los Angeles. Margarita also grapples with feeling disconnected from her sisters, as she most closely resembles her father, down to his drug use and his irresponsible behavior. When Margarita successfully accepts her identity, she finally achieves her goal by becoming an actress on a television show.
Diane is content in her life, living on a small farm and running a doggie daycare. However, Diane is a lesbian, and her family doesn’t know; this causes tension between her and her girlfriend. Diane struggles to tell her sisters and her mother out of fear that they will judge her, especially as Lacey May is openly racist, and even Noelle, a once-passionate advocate, occasionally makes thoughtless comments. Diane comes out to her sisters in a moment of anger, frustrated by their condescension. Though she has remained closely attached to her family her entire life, Diane makes it clear that she will choose Alma over them if she must. In the end, however, Diane’s family accepts her for who she is, allowing her to find happiness in her partner.
Noelle’s struggles are the most prominently represented in the book by virtue of her connection to Gee/Nelson. Noelle is always defiant and strong-willed as a child. In high school, Noelle clashes against her mother’s prejudiced efforts to keep students from the “bad” part of town out of her school. She defiantly seeks out one such student, Gee/Nelson, and eventually marries him. However, over time, Noelle loses her passions. After her miscarriage, Nelson spends a lot of time away from home—typically overseas, where he cheats on Noelle. Left to handle her grief on her own, Noelle loses the energetic defiance she once had in spades, instead keeping her head down and simply existing within a community that forces her to “pass” as someone she is not. Eventually, Noelle discovers Nelson’s infidelity, and finally pulls herself out of her situation. She makes her dreams come true on her own, finding not only herself but the family she has always wanted.
The Struggle to Understand One’s Identity
Each of the main characters struggles with their identity in some way. This theme is introduced with Jade when she loses Ray and realizes that she has to become the responsible mother Ray always believed she could be. Jade gives up her partying days and begins focusing on providing a good life for Gee. Jade is so determined to see Gee succeed where she and Ray did not that she loses focus on her own life, giving up the potential for happiness by refusing to go public with her boyfriend while Gee is still living in her home. Jade does not want the focus to shift from Gee, and she doesn’t want to share her responsibility for him. In Jade’s mind, she must be the one to see Gee succeed because it is what Ray would have wanted. In this way, Jade loses herself in her attempt to help Gee, and she only finds her peace many years later, long after Gee/Nelson becomes an adult.
Lacey May loses her identity as well. When the novel begins, Lacey May is Robbie Ventura’s wife and the mother of three little girls. She hasn’t known anything else her entire adult life, and she doesn’t want anything else. However, when Robbie develops a drug addiction, Lacey May finds herself on the verge of losing everything, including her children, because she has no work experience and no job prospects. Lacey May must find a new identity in order to survive and protect her daughters. For this reason, she marries another man. This is also the reason she uses to justify her racism when she fights the integration of the city and county schools. While Lacey May believes she is shielding her daughters from “bad” influences, she loses her daughters with her open prejudice. Not only that, but she does nothing to connect her daughters to their Latina heritage, robbing them of an important element of their own identities.
Gee struggles with his identity for several reasons. As a small child, Gee thought he was Ray’s son, and he basked in the light of that belief. After Ray’s death, that light is stolen from Gee’s life, and he learns Ray was not his biological father. Gee struggles not only with the violence that took Ray from him, but with the dimming of his memories of Ray and the lost connection to the only father he ever knew. Gee is never shown how to channel his grief and his anger over what happened to Ray, so he buries it deep inside, becoming someone who can’t share his emotions.
When the school integration moves Gee to a new school, he is pressured to represent his race. Additionally, Gee begins to have feelings for Noelle, leading to him changing his name from the childhood nickname of Gee to his given name, Nelson. Nelson feels that this change will make him feel more like the man he is becoming. This marks a shift in his self-perception, and he embraces an identity that is somewhat removed from Ray, which also signals his distance from his emotions. In the end, Nelson realizes he is not the man he wanted to be, stuck with the idea that he is a bad man because he let Noelle down. He regrets cheating on Noelle, and he realizes he has lost his place among the Venturas, leaving him feeling unmoored. His final scene with Jade, in which mother and son share their feelings about Ray for the first time, is a hopeful sign that Nelson has taken the first step in reconnecting with his feelings and rediscovering himself.
Diane and Margarita both struggle with identity as well. Diane struggles not in accepting her own identity, but in sharing the truth of herself with her family. Margarita struggles with the fact that she is the only one of her three sisters who is most like Robbie, as she most keenly missed out on the guidance that should have come from Robbie and his side of the family in regard to his Latin heritage. There is also a connection between them in regard to the use of drugs. Both Margarita and Diane find ways to deal with their identity struggles that make them happy, and by the end of the novel, they have embraced who they are and live in happiness.
Noelle’s identity struggles are the most prominent throughout the novel, as they are tied directly to her fight for her future. As a child, Noelle has a strong sense of self. She defies her mother from an early age and stands up for her beliefs all throughout school, going so far as to leave home because of her mother’s racist attitude. Ashamed of her biological family, Noelle tries to break her connection to them, hiding it when she can’t.
When she meets and later marries Nelson, she redefines herself by the family they make together. However, Nelson’s own struggles force them apart, and as Noelle enters adulthood, she loses touch with her identity. By the 2018 chapters, Noelle is a shell of the passionate advocate and performer she used to be, drifting in a sort of noncommittal limbo after the loss of her pregnancy. When she learns of Nelson’s infidelity, Noelle is forced to redefine herself once again. Noelle comes to terms with the family she grew up in, the family she imagined with Nelson, and the family she finally creates on her own. In these families, Noelle has very different ideas of who she is, but in the end, she is able to embrace the parts of herself she loves, such as her father’s Latin heritage and her role as a mother, and leave the other parts behind.
