Reviews

A Death in the Family by James Agee

fmcculley's review

emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

kenny_2288's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.5

An interesting thoughtful read, unfortunately I think it’s fairly obvious that the book was not completed when the author suddenly passed. I feel like it could’ve been much more had it been finished to the author’s idea, but we’ll never truly be able to know what he wanted to do with it. While hitting on themes of loss and desires to be admired and musings on God, ultimately the book seems disjointed and incomplete.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Death of parent

Moderate: Racial slurs, Racism, Alcoholism, Addiction, and Bullying

Minor: Blood and Animal death

hunterh's review against another edition

emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? Yes

3.75

csgiansante's review

3.0

Started strong, got a bit repetitive and preachy at the end.

_natasha's review

5.0

“My darkness, are you lonely? Darkness indeed came near. It buried its eye against the eye of the child’s own soul, saying: Had ever breathed, had ever dreamed, had ever been. Nothingness now revealed itself: that permanent night upon which the stars in their expiring generations are less than the glinting of gnats, and nebulae, more trivial than winter breath; that darkness in which eternity lies bent and pale, a dead snake in a jar, and infinity is the sparkling of a wren blown out to sea; that inconceivable chasm of invulnerable silence in which cataclysms of galaxies rave mute as amber.”

Monsters, nothingness, and loss. A father holding his cigarette lighter to the dark corner of a child’s room to reveal that monsters are made of nothing. Sing a song to help him sleep. Keep singing until you sing yourself to sleep, and sleep forever. The feeling that you were loved will stay with the child for eternity.

littlefury's review

reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

emzapk's review

5.0

I don't quite know how to describe Agee's beautiful writing - so all I will say is, I've never read anything that so well describes human emotion. I felt a deep connection with every narrator that I was not expecting. Agee has a way of explaining feeling and situation that has been matched by no other author I've read. Truly touching.

abbeyhar103's review

This was simultaneously too sad and too overly sentimental bordering on melodramatic for me. I did not finish. Halfway through.

laurpal74's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad slow-paced

3.25

rosemeeree's review

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0