In Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, who are Effia’s descendants?

Yaa Gyasi chronicles the lives of several of Effia Otcher’s descendants in her novel Homegoing. (You can read an in-depth discussion of the characters in Homegoing, including Effia's descendants, in the .) First is Quey Collins, the son of Effia, an Asante woman, and the British slave trader she married, Governor James Collins. Quey grows up at Cape Coast Castle in Ghana and is educated in England before returning home to...

Yaa Gyasi chronicles the lives of several of Effia Otcher’s descendants in her novel Homegoing. (You can read an in-depth discussion of the characters in Homegoing, including Effia's descendants, in the .) First is Quey Collins, the son of Effia, an Asante woman, and the British slave trader she married, Governor James Collins. Quey grows up at Cape Coast Castle in Ghana and is educated in England before returning home to become a slave trader himself. He marries Nana Yaa, the daughter of an Asante chief. Their son, James Richard Collins, becomes a slave trader as well. After entering into a loveless arranged marriage, James leaves his family and profession to be with a woman named Akosua who lives in an Asante village. There he becomes known as “Unlucky” because of his perpetually bad harvests. He and Akosua have a daughter, Abena, who has an affair with a man named Ohene. No one wants to marry Abena because of her father’s bad luck, which seems to have spread to the rest of the villagers and their crops. When Ohene becomes engaged to another woman, Abena leaves the village and goes to live at a Christian church in Kumasi. She dies giving birth to a daughter, Akua, who is raised in the missionary school. Akua marries a warrior named Asamoah and goes to live with his family in the village of Edweso, where she begins to have nightmares about a “firewoman” after witnessing a missionary being burned at the stake. Plagued by insomnia, Akua begins sleepwalking and, one night, burns down her family’s hut. She, her husband, and their son Yaw are the only survivors. Yaw, who is badly scarred by the fire, is educated in England and returns to Ghana to become a teacher. He marries Esther, a woman who he initially hired as his housekeeper. The two of them later move to Alabama with their daughter, Marjorie, who visits her beloved grandmother, Akua, in Ghana every summer. A good student, Marjorie is bullied at school for being too “white.” While attending Stanford she begins dating Marcus—a descendant of Effia’s half-sister, Esi—and later takes him with her to visit Ghana, where she gives him a necklace that once belonged to Effia.