The Wind Done Gone [Hardcover]

Alice Randall's Wind Done Gone was worth the wait. The author jolts our complacency about the Gone With the Wind days without, as many might have been lead to believe, focusing overtly on the Mitchell story itself; Wind Done Gone is less a parody, and more just a look at an era. Randall is seemingly subtle, using rich, sensory language (capable of both soothing and alarming) to tell this long overdue story; her twist on the story is thorough, clever and often amusing. I particularly liked her creative spin on the character names. "Mealy Mouth," "Twelve Slaves Strong as Trees" and "Other" all seem to capture an element of the original characters while at the same time making the new roles very relevent to Randall's own story (read the book to figure out who they are!) And the roles are new. The author has brought to life a world very different from the one we have accepted from Margaret Mitchell - these people and these places aren't what we thought they were at all. Randall's thoughtful take on this long-overdue parody is beautifully done. It was certainly no easy task, and she managed it masterfully. Wind Done Gone is an important book to have been written, it made me think, and I hope others can enjoy it and learn from it as I did.

Who in the publisher's house doesn't know the meaning of "parody"? This book is not a parody of "Gone with the Wind" but a moving companion piece to the GWTW world of Margaret Mitchell.

For almost seventy years, we have had Mitchell's view on the old South, the heroine Scarlett O'Hara and "Wind Done Gone" is an amazing work of fiction on the African-American point of view, its heroine, Cynara, Scarlett's half-sister.

The story is told in first person, stream of consciousness, which may be difficult for some to follow, as the author weaves back through Cynara's memories and revelations. Stream of consciousness isn't as straight-forward as a point by point, outlined presentation, but more realistic presents the human experience. I feel the author's style, presenting this as Cynara's diary is a wonderful way to tell this story.

There are some surprises along the way as Alice Randall gives detail to some of Mitchell's characters that were lesser characters to Scarlett and Rhett in GWTW. Not only the twists that change Mammy and Prissy from old derogitory stereotypes, but the detail she spins into the characters of Gerald and Ellen O'Hara, Scarlett's parents. Ellen, here called "Lady", is more interesting here than in the original, I think!

For those who are so affronted that a new frame of reference is given to a historical period, and a **work of fiction**-- well, no book is for "every one". However, look at any other real event in American history - in any country's history - in any one's life- and there is always more than one point of view!!! The original accounts of "Custer's Last Stand" from the Caucasian point of view were vastly different than the Native Americans' account of the battle. The American account of the final days of the defense of the Alamo are sharply contradicted by the Mexican accounts!

If anything, Alice Randall's book adds a richness to Mitchell's classic. And it means I can read GWTW and watch the movie without cringing when it comes to the depiction of the slaves.

I read the reviews on Amazon before I bought this book and have to say I enjoyed this book much more than I expected. Don't get so wrapped up in the mythos of GWTW that you forget that **it is a work of fiction, as is The Wind Done Gone** or that you forget that in art, as well as life, there is always more than one point of view, and the world is not just as it is seen by yourself and your culture!

Like many I found the title and the concept to be excellent, and looked forward to a toothsome novel that further developed beloved characters both black and white. But though the idea was great, the execution was poor in most areas.
The writing style was meant to be whimsical but just came out as confusing, inconsistant, and full of errors. Some sentences I couldn't even decipher after reading them several times. The timeline flip flops around too much and the narrator spends far too much time in self-absorbed self-dialogue when a bit more physical action might illustrate her points better. It's all feeling and no story - which makes the book less of an impact on the reader's mind.
Although some of the "secrets" were clever and interesting, some of the basic tenets were unbeleivable. The whole basis of GWTW was that Rhett loved Scarlett's mind as much as he did her body, so it's difficult to beleive he only married her because she reminded him of someone else.
As for infanticide...the concept that the slaves sometimes felt like they were the real owners of the plantation was probably very true, but to actually kill babies to keep it that way seems kind of pointless, as sooner or later another white master would come along, at least before the war.
As others have said, the character development was so poor that the author may as well have written a stand-alone novel instead of attaching her idea to a famous work and then ignoring the characters that readers buy the book to hear about in the first place. This was what happened in "Rhett Butler's People." If you're going to write the novel fine, but if you are counting on association to market it, be sure you write satisfyingly about the associated characters.
In closing - if you're going to do this sort of thing - do it right! I would have loved to hear more about Cynara's life if it was more meaty and not shrouded in such a fog of random, stream-of-conciousness impressions.