Reviews with content warning for Infertility - The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

Reviews tagging 'Infertility'

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride

30 reviews

kelly_e's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful reflective slow-paced

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

5.0

Title: The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store
Author: James McBride
Genre: Literary Fiction
Rating: 5.00
Pub Date: August 8, 2023

T H R E E • W O R D S

Human • Meandering • Hopeful

📖 S Y N O P S I S

In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new development, the last thing they expected to find was a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighborhood where immigrant Jews and African Americans lived side by side and shared ambitions and sorrows. Chicken Hill was where Moshe and Chona Ludlow lived when Moshe integrated his theater and where Chona ran the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. When the state came looking for a deaf boy to institutionalize him, it was Chona and Nate Timblin, the Black janitor at Moshe’s theater and the unofficial leader of the Black community on Chicken Hill, who worked together to keep the boy safe.

As these characters’ stories overlap and deepen, it becomes clear how much the people who live on the margins of white, Christian America struggle and what they must do to survive. When the truth is finally revealed about what happened on Chicken Hill and the part the town’s white establishment played in it, McBride shows us that even in dark times, it is love and community—heaven and earth—that sustain us.

💭 T H O U G H T S

I just had that special feeling about The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store when I first stumbled across it while researching upcoming releases in early 2023. There was no hesitating adding it to my TBR and I became more and more curious about it as it garnered allocades, especially when awarded the Barnes & Nobles Book of the Year Award. Because of all of this I was ecstatic when it was chosen as our March pick for my in-person book club.

McBride introduces the reader to a substantial cast of characters, and intentionally takes a slow, meandering approach in order to deliver an incredibly human story that culminates in a satisfying ending. There is no denying it does take some time to get settled into the complex lives and relationships between these characters, yet the payoff is huge in the end. What made this such a unique reading experience for me, is there is no one central character, rather each new character becomes the main character at a different point in the story. In this way, McBride offers a melting pot community, who despite their individual struggles and differences bond together in order to help one of their own. The real magic is how McBride demonstrates how the worst of us often leads to the best of us when it really counts. It really is pure magic!

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store is one of those stories that just got better and better with each page. What started out as an average read soon turned into so much more, culminating in my five-star review. Each piece of the puzzle was absolutely necessary in completing the picture. I can definitely understand the polarizing reviews as this book isn't going to work for everyone, but it was most definitely for me. This was my first venture into James McBride's work and I will be exploring his backlist further.

📚 R E A D • I F • Y O U • L I K E
• character driven stories
• quiet narratives
• jazz music

⚠️ CW: racism, racial slurs, antisemitism, xenophobia, religious bigotry, sexual assault, sexual violence, rape, child abuse, pedophilia, violence, forced institutionalization, ableism, death, death of parent, grief, medical trauma, medical content, chronic illness, excrement, classism, alcohol, infertility, cursing

🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S

"Light is only possible through dialogue between cultures, not through rejection of one or the other."

"Kindness. Love. Principle. It runs the world."

Content Warnings

zombiezami's review

Go to review page

dark emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

4.5

I read McBride's memoir about himself and his Jewish mom years ago. It's wonderful to see how, in addition to research, he clearly pulled from aspects of his upbringing in crafting this book. I will say that, although I liked the connection to USAmericans being on stolen land, this would have been a stronger theme if there were any indigenous characters, which there weren't, as far as I remember.

Content Warnings

betzine's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark hopeful inspiring fast-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

5.0

This one is a slow burn, but it’s an exquisitely crafted novel that comes together in a deeply moving, satisfying conclusion. James McBride has a gift for capturing America’s complex beauty— largely by depicting its profound ugliness with unabashed frankness. This is a novel that will stay with me forever.

Content Warnings

lavaly_1's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious relaxing sad medium-paced

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

5.0

Content Warnings

booksandabackpack's review

Go to review page

reflective sad medium-paced

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

Content Warnings

mysteryspouse's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging emotional inspiring reflective slow-paced

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

4.5

Content Warnings

ljtademy3's review

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad 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? Yes

5.0

I am speechless. James McBride has once again found a way to invoke the deepest emotional experience for me as a reader. This book provides commentary on racism, sexism, ableism, meritocracy, and the violence required to sustain these systems in a narrative built around a small community of very real and dimensional characters. The characters are so humorous, strong-willed, and are given depth/background spanning generations prior that allows you to see each character for so much more than most books allow you to see the characters. There are several plots taking place in this book and none of them are without reason. Every detail in the story is meticulously placed to create a really touching story. I read Deacon King Kong last year and loved it to pieces. The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store was a much more difficult read due to graphic content, but it is again not without reason that difficult topics are included in this story. James McBride has hands down become my favorite author and it is by a landslide.

Content Warnings

emilybartonspinks's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

4.5

Content Warnings

amber_thiels's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging emotional sad slow-paced

3.25

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store is where the people of Chicken Hill go for their groceries. I had such high hopes, a community coming together, mixed friendships, multiple storylines. It ultimately fell a little flat for me. There were two separate stories, Dodos and the shuls waterline and within those stories were smaller stories, a murder, Chonas death, Fatty going to Philly for a fat lip. It got really confusing as to why these stories were important. The ending felt rushed and incomplete with no mention of Moshe again. I think it's more on me for having high expectations of the book more than the book being hard to get through.

Content Warnings

emmakrof's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional hopeful sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store tells the story of from the perspectives of Jewish, Black, and White members of a small, early 20th century Pennsylvania town. There are many subplots (some of which I found totally uninteresting), but I found the “main” plot most intriguing — it had me racing to the end!

A Jewish couple must hide a deaf Black child to keep him from being institutionalized. But when the child stops the town’s doctor (and member of the KKK) from raping the unconscious woman who was sheltering him, the doctor turns him into the authorities. Rumors abound, but, of course, the white man’s story is believed. After a short but traumatic stay in the state mental institution, the community conspires to and succeeds in breaking the boy out. With money from Jewish friends, the black family buys a farm down South and goes on to live a fulfilling, prosperous life. And the doctor meets a karmic, albeit accidental, end.

One thing I really loved about this book was the way the author portrayed the dynamics between the Jewish, black, and white community members. He depicts the different concepts of self, life goals, allegiances, and tensions community members create (and the ideas they create about others) in order to coexist. Everyone has a complicated relationship with everyone else, both inter- and intra-racial. It felt very detailed and very human.

But I found a few of the characters kind of one-dimensional. In particular, I had complicated feelings about Chona. Chona is a Jewish woman who is beloved by all in the community. She rebukes racism, rebukes antisemitism, rebukes misogyny, rebukes gender roles, rebukes ableism. She is not afraid to speak her mind and do what she believes is right. She spends her life running a grocery store at a loss and giving food away for free to help alleviate structural poverty.

She does everything to protect Dodo from institutionalization, until the moment she dies. Perhaps her only flaw is not inquiring when her black childhood friend Bernice drops out of school and subsequently avoids public life.

Doubtlessly, Chona is a great person, and I enjoyed her role in the story!! But I am conflicted about how to feel about her. Her colorblind, abilityblind anyone-is-capable-of-everything approach to life feels naive; but at the same time, she is closer to the “truth” than many of the other characters in this book!

Though perhaps her death signifies that viewpoint alone cannot carry one to success?

Chona feels too perfect, too certain, but maybe that’s the point.

While I enjoyed the plot, I felt the ending was rushed. I would’ve liked to hear more about Dodo

and his escape

than some of the more mundane town drama the author spends so much time on. I liked the inclusion of the mundane drama as it added more dimension to the story, but I felt the balance could’ve been better.

My final gripe is that the author includes a seemingly random rant about how cellphones are ruining our lives?? The timing of this rant was bizarre

(right after the community learns about Chona’s death — are cellphones really that evil that they should overshadow the death of a beloved woman, that the characters’ reaction to them would be stronger than their grief in that moment??? TOTALLY anticlimactic, and it took me out of the scene completely.)

Additionally, it was about two thirds of the way through the book, and up until that point, the story was firmly set in the early 20th century; there was not a single mention about how the events of the story would be interpreted in the present day or vice versa. It was SO weird and out of place, and he never returns to this point? I was so confused that it brought my overall rating down.

Content Warnings

More...