Take a photo of a barcode or cover
4.36 AVERAGE
4.36 AVERAGE
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Roots: The Saga of An American Family
[ai:Alex Haley|17434|Alex Haley|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1182806085p2/17434.jpg] Alex Haley writes the multigenerational tale of what is supposedly his own family lineage – initially focused on Kunta Kinte and then his descendants Kizzy, George and others.
I had always planned to read Roots but had previously never gotten around to it. In 2017, I finally finished Canadian, [a:Lawrence Hill|20411|Lawrence Hill|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1233783749p2/20411.jpg]'s – [b:The Book of Negroes|23873268|The Book of Negroes|Lawrence Hill|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-a91bf249278a81aabab721ef782c4a74.png|860779], which I considered to be historical fiction following the life of Animata whose journey from Africa to America and then Canada seemed set in a very similar timeline and style as Alex Haley’s Roots.
What I didn’t expect was the change in protagonist. I was always under the impression that Roots was about Kunta Kinte, and that the story followed his life from his birth in Juffure, to his death in America. So when his daughter Kizzy was sold away to the “Massa Lea” I was surprised that we followed her from Virginia to North Carolina, leaving Kunta and Bell’s fates to our imagination.
This was actually quite a disappointment to me. We spent over 500 pages with Kunta Kinte and his character would have grown on Haley’s readers as he had grown on me. So the rapid timeline of Kizzy’s life as a small child on the Waller plantation with Missy Anne and her parents to her teens years and separation from her parents really wasn’t enough time for me to grow acquainted with her enough for the perspective to change. The focus on Kizzy did not last too long as she soon became pregnant and had a son, George, whose father is Kizzy’s master Lea, who repeated raped her.
George’s maturation seems even more rapid than Kizzy and suddenly she is gone from the picture and George is the main focal point. There are numerous chapters on George and Uncle Mingo and Massa Lea chicken fighting. We don’t hear much about or from Kizzy until Chicken George marries Matilda and start having children. I especially felt that the chicken fighting story chapters went on for way too long. I saw very little importance to the chicken fights. This felt extremely drawn out and boring to me. George and Kizzy eventually roughly calculate the amount of money he would need to win in chicken fighting to purchase their freedom.
Although the story of Roots is a billed as “the saga of an American family”, it did not retainmy interest through to the end. Haley spent so much of the story with Kunta Kinte that I would have preferred that Haley saw Kunta Kinte’s life story through.
[ai:Alex Haley|17434|Alex Haley|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1182806085p2/17434.jpg] Alex Haley writes the multigenerational tale of what is supposedly his own family lineage – initially focused on Kunta Kinte and then his descendants Kizzy, George and others.
I had always planned to read Roots but had previously never gotten around to it. In 2017, I finally finished Canadian, [a:Lawrence Hill|20411|Lawrence Hill|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1233783749p2/20411.jpg]'s – [b:The Book of Negroes|23873268|The Book of Negroes|Lawrence Hill|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-a91bf249278a81aabab721ef782c4a74.png|860779], which I considered to be historical fiction following the life of Animata whose journey from Africa to America and then Canada seemed set in a very similar timeline and style as Alex Haley’s Roots.
What I didn’t expect was the change in protagonist. I was always under the impression that Roots was about Kunta Kinte, and that the story followed his life from his birth in Juffure, to his death in America. So when his daughter Kizzy was sold away to the “Massa Lea” I was surprised that we followed her from Virginia to North Carolina, leaving Kunta and Bell’s fates to our imagination.
This was actually quite a disappointment to me. We spent over 500 pages with Kunta Kinte and his character would have grown on Haley’s readers as he had grown on me. So the rapid timeline of Kizzy’s life as a small child on the Waller plantation with Missy Anne and her parents to her teens years and separation from her parents really wasn’t enough time for me to grow acquainted with her enough for the perspective to change. The focus on Kizzy did not last too long as she soon became pregnant and had a son, George, whose father is Kizzy’s master Lea, who repeated raped her.
George’s maturation seems even more rapid than Kizzy and suddenly she is gone from the picture and George is the main focal point. There are numerous chapters on George and Uncle Mingo and Massa Lea chicken fighting. We don’t hear much about or from Kizzy until Chicken George marries Matilda and start having children. I especially felt that the chicken fighting story chapters went on for way too long. I saw very little importance to the chicken fights. This felt extremely drawn out and boring to me. George and Kizzy eventually roughly calculate the amount of money he would need to win in chicken fighting to purchase their freedom.
Although the story of Roots is a billed as “the saga of an American family”, it did not retainmy interest through to the end. Haley spent so much of the story with Kunta Kinte that I would have preferred that Haley saw Kunta Kinte’s life story through.
The endorsements on this book say it'll change the way you think about your family's history. Not only did it blow my mind on that level, but made me think about how I don't believe I've ever read about slavery from that perspective or with that amount of candidness. It's 730 pages of rich, incredible African history and culture (and Southern history from a perspective so rarely shown) that everyone should read.
So I finally read 'Roots', an American epic. 'Roots' and its characters are ingrained in the minds of all Americans mostly because of the miniseries. The moments that stick out to people probably are Kunta Kinte being whipped until he admits that he new name is Toby, Kunta Kinte getting his foot cut off, Kizzy being sold off, and one moment that always stood out for me was when Kizzy went to her father's grave and crossed out 'Toby' and wrote 'Kinta Kunte'. Well, guess what folks? A lot of stuff that happened in the miniseries never happened in the book or happened at a different point in the character's lives.
After that rant, I really didn't like the book. I had a lot of problems with it. And mind you, I didn't learn about Haley's plagiarism allegations until about midway through the book. And that frankly does not bother me in my review. I wish the book had been presented as historical fiction rather than fact. Haley is making most of the conversations and motivations of these characters up but his audience takes it as pure fact. And all the characters, by the way, are completely 2 dimensional. It's utterly horrible. There's no way you can relate to any of these characters. They act and think the same which is utterly ridiculous. During Kunta Kinte's time, the slaves literally tell you the history of the American Revolution. But nothing about what they went through, their emotions, their daily life during this period, NOTHING. Halet simply makes his characters tell you the history, and this happens again during Chicken George's time with the Civil War. When Kizzy was being raped, I didn't care. There's no emotional attachment to the characters. Haley also clearly was not comfortable writing in the female point of view. He only wrote in Kizzy's point of view for like 20 minutes (I read the audio book) and once Chicken George is able to talk (literally he's like a toddler) he switches to his point of view. How absurd is that?
And it kind of makes me mad that this is the book that makes people want to research their family history. Don't people realize that the only reason Haley was able to do all that research was because he had connections? YES! I went there.
After that rant, I really didn't like the book. I had a lot of problems with it. And mind you, I didn't learn about Haley's plagiarism allegations until about midway through the book. And that frankly does not bother me in my review. I wish the book had been presented as historical fiction rather than fact. Haley is making most of the conversations and motivations of these characters up but his audience takes it as pure fact. And all the characters, by the way, are completely 2 dimensional. It's utterly horrible. There's no way you can relate to any of these characters. They act and think the same which is utterly ridiculous. During Kunta Kinte's time, the slaves literally tell you the history of the American Revolution. But nothing about what they went through, their emotions, their daily life during this period, NOTHING. Halet simply makes his characters tell you the history, and this happens again during Chicken George's time with the Civil War. When Kizzy was being raped, I didn't care. There's no emotional attachment to the characters. Haley also clearly was not comfortable writing in the female point of view. He only wrote in Kizzy's point of view for like 20 minutes (I read the audio book) and once Chicken George is able to talk (literally he's like a toddler) he switches to his point of view. How absurd is that?
And it kind of makes me mad that this is the book that makes people want to research their family history. Don't people realize that the only reason Haley was able to do all that research was because he had connections? YES! I went there.
This was intense and engrossing. Really glad I finally read it, even though it is quite long. I really enjoy reading family sagas, and even though this was difficult to read sometimes, it is defintely worth it.
8/10
Despite taking more than a month to finish it, I really enjoyed it. I watched bits of the 1970s adaptation of the novel starring LeVar Burton and might check out the newer one that came out in 2016.
The last chapter, where Haley is narrating from his own point of view, really puts the book into perspective - that much more than a story, this is a representation of the millions of Africans who had been captured, brought to the new world, and then enslaved, brutally cut off from not only their family, but also their culture, language, and way of life. It's fascinating to learn how Haley's research corroborated with the family history that had been passed down orally, from generation to generation.
I am, however, disappointed to learn that Haley admitted that portions of the book were lifted from [b:The African|1238355|The African|Harold Courlander|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1388368326l/1238355._SX50_.jpg|1226998] by [a:Harold Courlander|107978|Harold Courlander|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], particularly passages about the transatlantic voyage. I still think this is a great feat, with over 850 pages of history brought to life, finely detailing the lives of slaves.
Despite taking more than a month to finish it, I really enjoyed it. I watched bits of the 1970s adaptation of the novel starring LeVar Burton and might check out the newer one that came out in 2016.
The last chapter, where Haley is narrating from his own point of view, really puts the book into perspective - that much more than a story, this is a representation of the millions of Africans who had been captured, brought to the new world, and then enslaved, brutally cut off from not only their family, but also their culture, language, and way of life. It's fascinating to learn how Haley's research corroborated with the family history that had been passed down orally, from generation to generation.
I am, however, disappointed to learn that Haley admitted that portions of the book were lifted from [b:The African|1238355|The African|Harold Courlander|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1388368326l/1238355._SX50_.jpg|1226998] by [a:Harold Courlander|107978|Harold Courlander|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], particularly passages about the transatlantic voyage. I still think this is a great feat, with over 850 pages of history brought to life, finely detailing the lives of slaves.
Overall, I loved this book. I felt more drawn into the story in the earlier parts, and at times felt that it was a completely different book from the midpoint on. I enjoyed the generational span this story had, but felt it was really rushed tooward the end. I felt absolutely no connection to the characters after they moved and drifted apart. The following generations stories were all squeezed into a few chapters, and I just wouldve liked to have seen a better ending. I also didn't care for the author's sudden input as the narrator in the end.
Wow.
At times slow, at times weird (there's a strange focus on how people smell for like 40 pages), rife with inexplicable typos, this book is as good and as important as you've been told.
At times slow, at times weird (there's a strange focus on how people smell for like 40 pages), rife with inexplicable typos, this book is as good and as important as you've been told.
adventurous
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No