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alexhutton's review
3.0
This is a woolly mammoth of a novel! Learnt a lot about the Atlanta child murders of the 80s (which I had never heard about before?!) and found the story of the Spencer family a compelling and devastating way to explore the wider socio-political tensions of the time. Unfortunately at 669 pages this was just Too Long™️ for me to fully enjoy, lots of characters introduced in the middle portion that made it hard to follow at times.Very glad that I persevered!
wuraoye's review
dark
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
lunabbly's review
5.0
An epic novel. Every word matters, every scene, thought that passes through each character's mind, every single detail matters in Toni Cade Bambara's These Bones Are Not My Child. What a heartbreaking novel -- one that has an inconclusive ending that totally mirrors reality of injustice. The wrong murderer is convicted and is a scapegoat. We go through the emotional journey of Black motherhood when a child goes missing through Marzala / Zala while she continues to raise 2 of her other children. We get glimpses and reflections of being a Black war veteran through Spencer (the father). All against the backdrop of community rallying together to protect, save, and deliver justice and accountability in a country that will never do that for us until we take matters into our own hands.
It's incredibly detailed and was clearly written for the Black working class. With Toni Morrison as the editor, it is a magnanimous work. One that I will certainly have to revisit to fully understand and comprehend.
It's incredibly detailed and was clearly written for the Black working class. With Toni Morrison as the editor, it is a magnanimous work. One that I will certainly have to revisit to fully understand and comprehend.
zoolmcg's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.5
I had this book on my TBR for the longest time before picking it up. The cover and the blurb and the title all drew me in, and I thought it’d be a perfect research read for my own novel. What I discovered with this read was a painfully tedious slog that I can’t ever see myself returning to.
I must mention first and foremost that I wasn’t aware of it’s posthumous publication until I was well into the book. That at first struck me as sweet, as Toni Morrison (who ‘edited’ it) was also featured on the cover with a quote. Then I got over 250 pages in and I quickly came to realise that this was not in fact a finished novel, but merely a preserved manuscript - and one at 669 pages at that. The entirety of this book needed a thorough comb over and culling in the editing stage, but I’m assuming due to Morrison’s affiliation with Bambara, this was avoided for the sake of maintaining a certain artistic license. What we as readers are left with is a dense and description heavy middle section that detracts from the real horrors and tension of the story. I saw another review reflect on how she gives as much descriptive weight to a single meal as she does to some of the most horrific and tense moments of the book, and it’s true. It’s hard to give certain scenes more weight when they’re all given an equal amount of tedious detail.
Onto some more positives, there were moments of dialogue and family dynamics that really stood out to me as excellent. Almost every scene of Zala and Spence together were great to read, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting a feel of their mental states through conversation. The last section that did this for me what Zala’s confrontation with her children towards the end about the landlord/roofing men being let in the house, which exemplified the trauma responses and anxiety towards strangers and her kids since Sonny’s disappearance.
I have to say that most of this book was a skim for me, otherwise I absolutely would not have finished it. It’s a shame because it seems like it had the potential to be such an impactful novel - a magnum opus as Morrison herself said. It fell so unbearably flat for me, and it’s a shame to have to admit when a piece of literature is so boring and unreadable that I found myself asking who certain characters were/what they were talking about, but lacking any curiosity whatsoever to go back a page or two to catch up. It sapped any interest out of me and I disliked it intensely.
I cannot in good conscious recommend this book at all. It’s too long, too descriptive, too unedited and far too aimless to enjoy in the slightest. I don’t want to write off Bambara as a creator completely, and down the line I may look at her pieces published while she was still alive, but this one is certainly a book to avoid wasting time with.
I must mention first and foremost that I wasn’t aware of it’s posthumous publication until I was well into the book. That at first struck me as sweet, as Toni Morrison (who ‘edited’ it) was also featured on the cover with a quote. Then I got over 250 pages in and I quickly came to realise that this was not in fact a finished novel, but merely a preserved manuscript - and one at 669 pages at that. The entirety of this book needed a thorough comb over and culling in the editing stage, but I’m assuming due to Morrison’s affiliation with Bambara, this was avoided for the sake of maintaining a certain artistic license. What we as readers are left with is a dense and description heavy middle section that detracts from the real horrors and tension of the story. I saw another review reflect on how she gives as much descriptive weight to a single meal as she does to some of the most horrific and tense moments of the book, and it’s true. It’s hard to give certain scenes more weight when they’re all given an equal amount of tedious detail.
Onto some more positives, there were moments of dialogue and family dynamics that really stood out to me as excellent. Almost every scene of Zala and Spence together were great to read, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting a feel of their mental states through conversation. The last section that did this for me what Zala’s confrontation with her children towards the end about the landlord/roofing men being let in the house, which exemplified the trauma responses and anxiety towards strangers and her kids since Sonny’s disappearance.
I have to say that most of this book was a skim for me, otherwise I absolutely would not have finished it. It’s a shame because it seems like it had the potential to be such an impactful novel - a magnum opus as Morrison herself said. It fell so unbearably flat for me, and it’s a shame to have to admit when a piece of literature is so boring and unreadable that I found myself asking who certain characters were/what they were talking about, but lacking any curiosity whatsoever to go back a page or two to catch up. It sapped any interest out of me and I disliked it intensely.
I cannot in good conscious recommend this book at all. It’s too long, too descriptive, too unedited and far too aimless to enjoy in the slightest. I don’t want to write off Bambara as a creator completely, and down the line I may look at her pieces published while she was still alive, but this one is certainly a book to avoid wasting time with.
sageyywageyy's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
kateivy's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
I fully understand the importance of this novel to the community of Atlanta. Bambara did an excellent job of layering all the different connections and influences to make the systemic racism and corruption clear. As a mother, watching Zala and Spence deal with a parent's worse nightmare was difficult, as was seeing how this trauma affected the other children. Those dynamics affected me the most. However, the majority of this novel, I would say, commends the community that rose together to take action when they saw others wouldn't. It was beautiful to see how all of these people come together to try and save their communities children. However, those sections were very dense and hard to understand. It was difficult parsing through what they were doing, why, and how that had later impact.
jessg17's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
mcrammal's review
challenging
dark
emotional
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
This novel offers a very realistic and vivid depiction of what families had to go through when a child in their family went missing during such a scary and confusing time. From day to day during the first few weeks of disappearance to the affects it still has years later, Toni Cade Bambara did a wonderful job of showing a side of true crime most don’t think about when learning about a case. I will say though, as someone who struggles when a lot of characters are introduced to a story regardless of the form of media, I struggled a bit to remember who was who in some parts.
poetskings's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75