Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK THAT EVERYONE WILL BE TALKING ABOUT ‘Beautiful ... In Jeffers' deft hands, the story of race and love in America becomes the Great American Novel’ JACQUELINE WOODSON, author of Red at the Bone ‘As brilliant as it is necessary, as intimate as it is expansive’ ANGIE THOMAS, author of The Hate U Give

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois

Honoree Fanonne Jeffers

The award-winning poet and essayist makes her fiction debut with this magisterial epic--an intimate yet sweeping novel with the freshness and forcefulness of Homegoing, The Turner House, and The Water Dancer --that chronicles the journey of one American family from the centuries of the colonial slave trade through the Civil War to our own tumultuous time. "My life had its significance and its only deep significance because it was part of a Problem," W. E. B. Du Bois once wrote. Since childhood, Ailey Pearl Garfield has understood these words all too well. Bearing the names of two formidable Black Americans--the revered choreographer Alvin Ailey and her great grandmother, the descendant of slaves and tenant farmers--Ailey carries the weight of this Problem on her shoulders. The daughter of an accomplished doctor and a strict schoolteacher, Ailey is raised in the City but spends summers in the small Georgia town of Chicasetta, where her mother's family has lived since their ancestors arrived from Africa in bondage. Growing up, she struggles with this duality, a battle for belonging that shapes her identity. On one side are her exacting parents and her imperious, light-skinned grandmother Nana Claire, to whom skin color is paramount. On the other, Ailey feels the pull of the "deep country" of her mother's land-tending family, whose forebears endured the horrors of slavery and Jim Crow. But how can Ailey live up to everyone's expectations when half of her family rejects the truth of a fraught racial history, while the rest can't ever seem to break away from it? To come to terms with who she is and what she wants, Ailey embarks on a journey through her family's past, uncovering shocking and unexpected tales of generations of ancestors--Black, Indigenous, and white--in the deep South. In doing so Ailey must learn to embrace her full heritage, a legacy of oppression and resistance, bondage and independence, cruelty and resilience that is the story of the Black experience in America itself.

Macy HB

Questions in the non sequiturs typical of the very young.

Every lover lies to herself, in small and large ways.

Even in a place of sorrow, time passes. Even in a place of joy. Do not assume that either keeps life from continuing.

and laid her cheek against the wild curls that smelled like blue grease and a peaceful yesterday.

From Darkwater: Voices from Within the Veil by W.E.B. Dubois 

The future woman must have a life work and economic independence. She must have knowledge. She must have the right of motherhood at her own discretion. The present mincing horror at free womanhood must pass if we are ever to be rid of the bestiality of free manhood; not by guarding the weak in weakness do we gain strength, but by making weakness free and strong.

A woman singing off-key praises to the Lord. The sweet fruit dripping with juice. The sound of bugs. I thought of what Mama liked to say: to find this kind of love, you have to enter deep country.

The names of the captives are lost to everyone but us. Their tribes. Their children, if they had them. Their beloveds they'd hoped to marry in ceremonies of laughter and wine. The rovers passing through their nations . Their words for a rooster cock-crowing. For delectable fruit, skin the color of red intruding yellow. For their warbles and ticks of joy. 

Chris Dailey

Intergenerational epic spanning centuries focused on a single family's journey in the late 20th century with interspersed vignettes about their Africa, Creek and European ancestors. Centered on the Garfield clan and their relatives in rural Georgia, we see the contemporary Black experience as a well to do, educated family navigates American racism. Family, faith, sexuality, assault, education, drugs, politics, history and, above all, race and trauma rain down throughout the nearly 800-pages. Consistently engaging and informative, frequently touching and insightful, and, at times, devastating. The strongest moments are dreamlike and tragic.

Ryan 

4.5 stars

i'd be thinking why this book needed to be almost 800 pages but after reading this, i truly see why this book NEEDS to be 800 pages long. this book covers an expansive family study that's well-organized and brought up remarks on sexism, Black womenhood, and double-consciousness (hence the book title). jeffer's writing puts a distance between me and the characters where i'm not too attached yet the objective tone has led me into caring most of the main characters. it's truly remarkable that this is a debut novel from a poet.

Noemi Gonzalez

Joy Bush

4.75🌟
It took me 4 months to read (audiobook) this in between other books. 
I'm going to write up a full review tomorrow, it will be long.

It was a tough read but a well paced one. 

Sierra Van Ryck deGroot

Sarai Johnson

For a book so long, it lacks depth. The characters are flat and stereotypical. The main character’s perspective lacks insight. Why does she make the choices she makes? Some of the choices are crystal clear, most are not. There are too many characters. Many of the characters are indistinguishable from one another. For example, Lydia and Ailey felt remarkably similar. Upon further reflection, I don’t really know why Lydia was in the book at all.

I agree with many other critical reviews that this could have been much shorter. Much of the middle of the book feels unnecessary. The college years could have been cut down to a single chapter, IMO. Ailey’s college relationships add so little to the already sparse narrative.

And: This line made me gag: “she let Midas court her womb the same as he had done her heart.”

I was really apprehensive to start on this journey because the book seemed a bit intimidating at first, but it is a quest through history and family lineage that I needed. This book made me ask questions of my family, my own history and lineage and helped me to get those answers for myself. My perspectives widened and my understanding of the connection between Africans and native Americans has strengthened. This is a historical fiction that shows the value of stories passed down, and knowledge of where you come from. 

The way the stories are intertwined is artful and pointed. Each recollection gives more and more context into the power of lineage and how interconnected families throughout history have always been. This is a thoughtful reminder of the connections we all share, despite the stark differences in our individual experience. 

Shanice Sinclair

I was really apprehensive to start on this journey because the book seemed a bit intimidating at first, but it is a quest through history and family lineage that I needed. This book made me ask questions of my family, my own history and lineage and helped me to get those answers for myself. My perspectives widened and my understanding of the connection between Africans and native Americans has strengthened. This is a historical fiction that shows the value of stories passed down, and knowledge of where you come from. 

The way the stories are intertwined is artful and pointed. Each recollection gives more and more context into the power of lineage and how interconnected families throughout history have always been. This is a thoughtful reminder of the connections we all share, despite the stark differences in our individual experience. 

Satya Nelms

The scope of the stories told in this book is epic. The level of detail is staggering. The genius required to tell a story across generations and even continents in the way this has been told is awe-inspiring. When I finally reached that last page I was surprised to find myself emotional. The characters felt real and I bore witness to so many of their struggles and triumphs. I am sad to have reached the end of the book, but am grateful to have read it.

Marloes

4,5 * This book is grand. Not only in size, but also the content as this covers a family history and topics (of which slavery is definitely an important one) in a comprehensive, beautiful and poetic manner. I love how Fanonne Jeffers build realistic, layered and strong characters. It took me quite pages to feel the eagerness to know what happens but the whole read was complete, intimate and worth it.

Fraser Simons

Liked it. A tad overhyped, tbh. But I’ll sleep on it and let it percolate before codifying a review.

the promised review: 
This is the story of a complicated family, very much, to my mind, embodying a quintessential contemporary black culture. We begin all the way back, briefly, to their ancestors' enslavement, and proceed to establish the generations of come. The book dwells primarily with Ailey Pearl Garfield, though it is so long that it actually takes a while to get a bead on her. And just when we do, the narrative structure can pull us away, reinforcing that Ailey is a product of her direct rearing as well as the past. We spend time with her mother only after we see what kind of person Ailey grows to be, for instance. We know more about her mother's mother than she herself. And just when you have a grip on it, the book proceeds to draw a more complex web that makes the themes, characters, and family very contemporary, as mentioned. 

Interestingly, though the book tackles some really oppressive and dark themes, its arrangement is its biggest strength, even as it causes the larger story to be somewhat opaque until a significant portion in. As far as I can tell the themes cascade. Especially when important. When underage and pedophilic physical and emotional abuse comes up for one family member, we then proceed through the web of the family further to see its roots and its contemporary nature. When Ailey sees the ramifications of marriage and tying herself to a man has gotten her mother and her grandmother--we proceed, again, to see the history behind that decision and witness the lack of agency the women had in making that choice. Consciously or otherwise, depending on the time period. By the end, this is the most compelling aspect of the book. The nuance and complexity are presented in an easily digestible manner and are built up methodically and slowly.

The pacing and the way in which many of the themes are not being struck as a chord until later was the number one challenging aspect of the book. To begin to see dividends from time and effort, you have to be around 400+ pages in the book. You just have to trust that you will get there--unless you enjoy the prose very much and it doesn't become a slog. Some of the time periods were exactly the style I like: lyrical, complex sentence structure, and high degrees of specificity. Probably because those aspects are very indicative of historical fiction. Whereas the contemporary prose, the "primary" narrative, is Hemingwayesque, but lacking the punch of full stop arrests and descriptive, evocative specificity that I, myself, prefer. On audio, the simple prose feels called out. And, later, when Ailey is more grown, they don't reflect her intellectual level. They only skate when she is a child and teenager. 

The book does succeed at what it's trying to do, which is very ambitious. It's accessible and deceptively easy to consume, while being nuanced and layered, and not too overwhelming with the very heavy subject matter it endeavors to portray in a similarly nuanced but realistic and unflinching manner. The arrangement is by far the most impressive aspect. But if you can't get on with the narrative voice of the text, I imagine this book will feel interminable and opaque, and you'll have to force yourself through. In which case, do as I did and pick up the audiobook so you can still consume this accomplishment of a book.

Lydia Enge

Waahida Mansion

Jaymie Lemke

Sara Holman

Liz Prinz

A New York Times Book Everyone Will Be Talking About “This sweeping, brilliant and beautiful narrative is at once a love song to Black girlhood, family, history, joy, pain… and so much more. In Jeffers' deft hands, the story of race and love in America becomes the great American novel.” —Jacqueline Woodson, author of Red at the Bone and Another Brooklyn A People 5 Best Books of the Summer • An Essence Best Book of the Summer • A Ms. Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Goodreads Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Book Page Writer to Watch • A USA Today Hottest Summer Book • A Chicago Tribune Summer Must-Read • An Observer Best Summer Book • A BiblioLifestyle Most Anticipated Literary Book of the Summer • A Deep South Best Book of the Summer The 2020 National Book Award–nominated poet makes her fiction debut with this magisterial epic—an intimate yet sweeping novel with all the luminescence and force of Homegoing; Sing, Unburied, Sing; and The Water Dancer—that chronicles the journey of one American family, from the centuries of the colonial slave trade through the Civil War to our own tumultuous era. The great scholar, W. E. B. Du Bois, once wrote about the Problem of race in America, and what he called “Double Consciousness,” a sensitivity that every African American possesses in order to survive. Since childhood, Ailey Pearl Garfield has understood Du Bois’s words all too well. Bearing the names of two formidable Black Americans—the revered choreographer Alvin Ailey and her great grandmother Pearl, the descendant of enslaved Georgians and tenant farmers—Ailey carries Du Bois’s Problem on her shoulders. Ailey is reared in the north in the City but spends summers in the small Georgia town of Chicasetta, where her mother’s family has lived since their ancestors arrived from Africa in bondage. From an early age, Ailey fights a battle for belonging that’s made all the more difficult by a hovering trauma, as well as the whispers of women—her mother, Belle, her sister, Lydia, and a maternal line reaching back two centuries—that urge Ailey to succeed in their stead. To come to terms with her own identity, Ailey embarks on a journey through her family’s past, uncovering the shocking tales of generations of ancestors—Indigenous, Black, and white—in the deep South. In doing so Ailey must learn to embrace her full heritage, a legacy of oppression and resistance, bondage and independence, cruelty and resilience that is the story—and the song—of America itself.

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois

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