What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours (2015) is a collection of nine short stories written by Helen Oyeyemi. The stories feature some recurring characters, and all contain a literal or metaphorical key. Oyeyemi is a popular British author whose works include Mr. Fox (2011) and Boy, Snow, Bird (2014). She does not consider her works to be “magical realism,” but that is the genre where they are most often placed, as they tend to incorporate fantastical or fairy tale elements in otherwise prosaic settings. This summary is based on the 2016 hardcover edition published by Riverhead Books.

Content Warning: This guide references misogyny and violence against women.

Summary

The collection comprises nine short stories. Each story has a unique plot, though a few characters appear in more than one story, implying a shared world.

“Books and Roses” follows an orphaned young woman, Montserrat, who wears a key around her neck that was left for her by her mother. She meets an artist named Señora Lucy, who also wears a key given to her by a woman she once loved, Safiye. When Montserrat’s key fits the library door of the Salazar estate, a lawyer gives her a letter from her mother, Aurelie. Aurelie worked at the Salazar house and became pregnant by a young man who left her. She found the key to the library, where she met Isidoro Salazar. Soon, they fell in love. Isidoro was chronically ill. Fearing his death, he asked Aurelie to find a priest to marry them. Later, Aurelie and the priest find Isidoro dead. The priest says he’s been dead for a day, but Aurelie insists she just spoke to him. She is accused of murder, so she runs away, leaving the letter for her baby. Montserrat sees a door in the library that leads to a secret rose garden. She finds Lucy there with the other key.

“‘Sorry’ Doesn’t Sweeten Her Tea” follows a man named Anton who house sits for his friend Chedorlaomer, a famous singer, and works in his aunt’s sleep weight loss center with a woman named Tyche Shaw. Anton has two stepdaughters, Dayang and Aisha. Aisha is obsessed with a pop star named Matyas Füst, who is accused of assault. Matyas releases a song and music video as an apology, which seems insincere to Aisha. When Aisha plans to attack Matyas, Anton enlists the help of Tyche. Tyche and Aisha implore the goddess Hecate to make Matyas genuinely sorry. Afterward, he gives multiple impassioned apologies to the woman he assaulted and to his fans. Aisha feels that he is getting closer to identifying his mistake and should keep trying.

“Is Your Blood as Red as This?” follows Radha Chaudhry, who is in love with a young puppeteer named Myrna Semyonova. Radha asks Myrna to train her in puppetry so she can join Myrna at her school next year. At the audition, Radha meets Tyche Shaw, whose puppet is a porcelain chess piece that only asks, “Is your blood as red as this?” (111). In her audition, Radha’s finger puppet only wants to eat sugar cubes and sleep, so one of the student mentors, Gustav Grimaldi, brings her another puppet, claiming it is haunted. Radha, who is used to speaking with a ghost in her room, helps the puppet tell her story: The puppet is a woman named Gepetta and is not haunted, but alive. Gepetta used to be a human woman who took care of the puppets at the school, but as she became ill from a plague, the puppets she cared for switched her body parts one by one until she became a full puppet. Radha is the first person who can understand her. Radha and Tyche are selected for the school but Myrna elects to work with Tyche, and Radha’s mentor is Gustav. Tyche doesn’t like Myrna because she doesn’t understand what Tyche, Gustav, and Radha all do about speaking the puppets’ language. In History of Puppetry class, Gepetta and Radha meet and befriend Rowan Wayland, who is avoided by most of the other students.

“Drownings” follows a young man named Arkady whose parents were drowned by the tyrant ruler of his country when he was a child. The tyrant drowns anyone he feels is in opposition to him, which can be for any reason and has led to the deaths of countless citizens. Arkady forms a found family with a young man named Giacomo and Leporello, a dog. Arkady develops a crush on his boss, a woman named Lokum who serves as the tyrant’s physician and is also the object of the tyrant’s affection. When Arkady lets his attraction to Lokum be known, she dismisses him from his job for his own safety. Meanwhile, Giacomo discovers that their apartment key can open any door in their building, and enjoys the view from one of the other apartments. After Arkady loses his job, they must move to a different, smaller room. When Arkady learns that Giacomo still has the key, he throws it into the fire. The next morning, police inform Arkady that he’s wanted for burning down their old apartment building; nine people have died.

“Presence” follows Jill Akkerman and Jacob Wallace, a childless married couple who have known each other since their troubled youths. Jill worries that Jacob is growing tired of their marriage. Jacob asks her to help him test his new program called “Presence,” which will allow people to spend time with their deceased loved ones by making their memories manifest. Once Presence starts, Jill experiences extreme cold, finds herself in a perpetual 12:30, and finds it difficult to eat. Soon, she meets her and Jacob’s hypothetical son, Alex, in the Presence experience. It becomes strange, and she waits for him to leave. She finds Jacob at home in a similarly disoriented state in his own version of Presence. She tells him that they should scrap Presence and never do this to another couple, and he agrees.

“A Brief History of the Homely Wench Society” follows Dayang Sharif at Cambridge University. She is invited to join the Homely Wench Society, which formed in the 1940s when the all-male Bettencourt Society played a cruel joke by inviting the “homeliest wench” to their annual dinner for campus “beauties.” The women on the list of potential “wenches” formed their own society to prank the men and take back their dignity. Dayang takes the club seriously, and she dismisses the advances of Hercules Demetriou, a Bettencourter. However, another Wench, Flor, dates a Bettencourter and learns the access code to the Bettencourt Society headquarters. The Wenches break in and swap out the Bettencourters’ books with books by female writers. Meanwhile, Hercules asks Dayang to attend a screening of John Waters’ movie Female Trouble. She declines, and he insists that she might actually like him if she gave him a chance. Dayang invites Pepper to attend the screening with her instead. After, Hercules waits on Dayang’s building’s steps, reading one of the books left behind by the “Homely Wenches.” Hercules invites her to the Bettencourt dinner with him, but she insists that he ask someone else. Later, the Bettencourters, led by Hercules, approach the “Homely Wenches’” building with food and drink, waving a white flag.

“Dornička and the St. Martin’s Day Goose” is about a woman named Dornička who encounters a “wolf” on a mountain. The “wolf” mistakes her for someone implied to be Little Red Riding Hood, but lets her go when he sees that she’s old. Dornička offers to send something young and tender for him to eat in order to spare other unsuspecting hikers. He agrees, but strikes her on the hip creating a bruise that grows into a lump. The lump grows larger and larger; eventually, Dornička cuts it off and buries it beneath the ash tree in her garden. Dornička’s goddaughter Alžběta visits with her daughter Klaudie. Klaudie says something smells good by the ash tree. The goose that Klaudie chooses for St. Martin’s Day dinner will only eat from Klaudie’s hands and is also attracted to the smell of the lump under the tree. Dornička digs up the lump and puts it into a locked wooden box. When Klaudie still attempts to seek out the source of the delicious smell, Dornička feeds the lump to the goose. The next day, Klaudie says the goose has changed; it has doubled in size and seems more intelligent. Dornička orders a red hooded cloak. On the night before St. Martin’s Day, the goose comes into her room, already dressed in the red cloak and holding her car keys in its beak. She drives the goose up the mountain, thanking the goose as she sends it to the “wolf”.

“Freddy Barrandov Checks…In?” is about a young man named Freddy Barrandov Jr. who struggles to live up to the reputation of his father, Freddy Barrandov Sr. Freddy’s mother wants him to follow in his father’s footsteps and work for the Hotel Glissando, but he prefers his work as a nursery-school teacher. He dates a grown-up Aisha, who makes a short film starring two puppet siblings voiced by Chedorlaomer and Tyche, who are now dating. Freddy is approached by a man named Jean Claude, who Freddy remembers vaguely as his godfather. Jean Claude is Chedorlaomer’s biological father who faked his own death to get away from Ched’s mother. Jean Claude offers Freddy money to break up Chedorlaomer and Tyche. Freddy, in need of money, agrees. He gets Aisha to introduce him to Ched and Tyche; Aisha suggests that he invite them to hang out with his roommate Pierre, who is a very sensual person. However, neither Ched nor Tyche is tempted by Pierre. Next, Freddy tries but fails to prove they are somehow related. Freddy plans to lie to them instead, but when he sees them again, their passion is so intense that he loses his resolve.

“If a Book Is Locked There’s Probably a Good Reason for That Don’t You Think” is related by an unnamed narrator in second-person. You work in an office in the UK that gets an intriguing new coworker from America named Eva. You try to befriend Eva unsuccessfully. Your job is to determine which employees should be fired; you find this task unpleasant because it does not take into account the needs or personalities of employees. You feel a kinship with Eva, who seems confident and independent. One day a woman comes into the office with her young son and accuses Eva of seeing her husband. You help Eva clean up her spilled bag after the woman is escorted out; you notice a journal with a brass lock, and your curiosity grows. Eva becomes unpopular in the office after the confrontation, and someone steals Eva’s diary. Eva asks for it back, offering anything in return. Later, she finds a note offering the diary in exchange for her resignation. She resigns, and the next day, another coworker “finds” the diary. You offer to return it, but don’t know where she lives. You pick the lock to see if there’s an address inside. After averting your eyes from a list of reasons why Eva doesn’t like to talk, you find an address on the back cover. The diary unfolds itself and words start to fill the air as the diary also absorbs what is around it. Negative voices, mostly men’s, swirl out, criticizing Eva for speaking too much or not enough. You manage to shut the diary, sitting on it to keep it closed. When you arrive at the listed address, a man there claims not to know an “Eva” but directs you to the roof. From the neighboring rooftop, Eva notices you as she swings on a swing set. You assure her that you never read her diary, but Eva suggests that’s not the reason she kept it locked.