Reviews

The Narrows by Ann Petry

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candelibri's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional tense slow-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

bthcnln's review against another edition

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no real reason, just put it down and then never reached for it

kitnotmarlowe's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

My hopes for The Narrows were sky-high. I read The Street last year and rated it 4.5 stars. But everyone and their mother says that The Narrows is not just the better book but Ann Petry's masterpiece. So, of course, I had to read that too.

Surprisingly, The Street's greatest strength, its sense of pace and motion, was also The Narrows' greatest weakness, at least for me. While it is more formally ambitious, I found it to be a more leisurely reading experience, not always in a good way. There's a lot of plot to get through, and you're just waiting for something to go wrong with Link and Camilo in the middle to shake things up a little. Petry takes her time with this novel but makes good use of it, so it's not as bad as I make it out to be. In fact, it's probably only a problem if you read The Street first, as I did.

Petry's disruption of language has a wonderfully rowdy lyricism to it. The colours are grayblack and redorange, Link's detested teacher is Miss pause Dwight, and the ideal woman is MamiePowtherChinaCamiloWilliams. Perspective spills effortlessly from one character to the next, from the past to the present. If I had to compare this book to a literary era, it would be the mid-nineteenth-century doorstopper. Petry's panorama of Black New England, her interweaving of African songs and spirituality alongside references to Shakespeare, the white faces of classic Hollywood, and the doomed romance at its centre, have a touch of Tolstoy.

Calling The Narrows a romance is not only reductive but also inaccurate. While Camilo and Link's relationship can be deeply romantic, it's a love affair between two sticks of dynamite. There is no life for them as a pair except mutual destruction until they learn to recognize the other person's humanity. There is no life for them as a pair except mutual destruction until they learn to recognize the other person's humanity. Camilo can't see past Link's race, and Link can't see past Camilo's sex. There's almost something satisfying when they're caught. And then, of course, everything goes to hell even faster than it already has.

Ann Petry also nails the intersections of race, class, and shame, just as in The Street. Abbie earns money as a landlord (a neat inversion of The Street's major conflict) and is picky about who she rents her house to. Powther is affluent enough to be the chauffeur for a prominent white family, so Abbie agrees to rent to him. She looks down on Black people she believes are doing a disservice to The Race (always capitalized) and policed Link's appearance, manners, and even food preferences growing up to ensure he, too, would be a credit to The Race. Abbie carries so much internalized shame with her that she must inflict it on others. In her efforts to dispel racial stereotypes, she loses her sense of community and eventually drives her only child away. Part of Link's arc's tragedy is that he is a credit to The Race. He's an Ivy League scholar and a war veteran; he's attractive in a way that white people find acceptable to the point of fetishization. He's accomplished a lot, but it's not enough to save him from his fate.

Miscellaneous notes:

In Chapter 5, there's mention of a character named (and I shit you not) "Matthew Mark Luke John Acts-of-the-Apostles Son-of-Zebedel Garden-of-Gethsemane Hill, known as Mamaluke Hill. For Short."
In Chapter 1, Link tells Abbie, "[Frances] was here so often that I used to think she was my father and you were my mother." Gay rights.

cesarreads's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

shanthereader's review against another edition

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challenging reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

kk0sanda's review against another edition

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Just wasn’t feeling it enough

serendipitysbooks's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I really enjoyed The Narrows, although I did find the structure to be challenging. The integration of flashbacks and the switch between past and present was so seamless that it sometimes made it difficult to tell when something was happening. Overall this books required just a bit more mental bandwidth in places than I had available. Sadly, I’m also lacking the mental energy to write the sort of review this book deserves so I’ll settle for just a couple of quick comments.

Ann Perry’s writing stunned once again particularly the vivid way she portrayed her characters and The Narrows, a mostly Black community in a white town in Connecticut, where the story unfolds. Although originally published in 1953 the commentary on race and class, especially the danger entitled wealthy white women can pose to Black men, felt especially topical. I really appreciated the sections which focussed on the role of newspapers in reporting and thus shaping the news, and the way their wealthy owners can attempt to compromise the impartiality of the reporting. Again this feels timely and relevant.

Definitely a modern classic that deserves more attention.

Content Warnings