Oreo

 

By Fran Ross

An Oreo is a person who looks black but who has a white soul, I guess. Not too sure about that, really.

Christine Schwartz had a black mother and a white Jewish father. When she was just a toddler, her parents split and her father vanished from her life. But he left behind a list of clues that would help Christine find him when she got old enough. 

So when she is about 14 or 15, she set out to track down her missing father, following the very cryptic clues he left to help her in her quest:

1. Sword and sandals
2. Three legs
3. The great divide
4. Sow
5. Kicks
6. Pretzel
7. Fitting
8. Down by the River
9. Temple
10. Lucky number
11. Amazing
12. Sails

Christine, who also goes by Oreo, sets out on her journey to find her father based on this list. She rather accidentally solves the clues given her and has various adventures, mostly once she reaches New York City. She does track down her father but it doesn't end well.

I didn't know this when I was reading the story, but Christine's quest is based on the travels of Theseus. Now, I am not a person who cares about mythology so I didn't catch on to this until the end of the book where the last chapter is the author explaining the how Christine's quest is based on Theseus. At the end of that chapter is list matching the characters to the characters in the Theseus story:

• Aegeus — Samuel Schwartz, Christine's father
• Aethra — Helen Clark, Christine's mother
• Apollo Delphinius — Apollo Theatre
• Ariadne — Adriana Minotti
• Cephissus — Jordan River's sauna
• Cercyon — Kirk, a large, dangerous man
• Heracles — Uncle Herbert, Christine's great uncle
• Medea — Mildred Schwartz, Samuel Schwartz's wife
• Minos — Minotti, a business associate of Samuel Schwartz
• Minotaur — Toro, a bulldog
• Pandion — Jacob Schwartz, Christine's grandfather, Samuel's father
• Pasiphae — Bovina Minotti, wife of Minotti
• Periphetes — Perry, a thief (gonif) who tried to attack Christine in NYC
• Phaea — Pig killed by a taxi
• Pittheus — James Clark, Christine's grandfather
• Procrustes — Manager of a shoe store in NYC
• Sciron — Parnell the pimp who kidnapped Christine
• Sinis — Joe Doe, a bad little boy in a NYC park
• Theseus — Christine Schwartz

I didn't care for the book. I didn't know it was a parody of the Theseus myth. If I had known that, I probably wouldn't have bought the book. 

Here is a review by Kirkus Reviews.