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deedireads's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
All my reviews live at https://deedispeaking.com/reads/.
TL;DR REVIEW:
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois is a true feat. This one feels like a new great American novel, sweeping and forceful. I loved all 800 pages, and I expect it to win many awards.
For you if: You like multigenerational family novels and/or historical fiction.
FULL REVIEW:
TL;DR REVIEW:
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois is a true feat. This one feels like a new great American novel, sweeping and forceful. I loved all 800 pages, and I expect it to win many awards.
For you if: You like multigenerational family novels and/or historical fiction.
FULL REVIEW:
“We are the earth, the land. The tongue that speaks and trips on the names of the dead as it dares to tell these stories of a woman’s line.”
Please allow me to add my voice to the throng of people who are insisting that you get a copy of this book and read it. It’s a sweeping, epic 800 pages honoring Black and Indigenous women throughout American history, and I believe those calling it the next great American novel are on the nose.
The main character of the novel is Ailey Pearl Garfield; it starts when she’s a young child and follows her until she’s in her mid-30s. But it’s about so much more — so many more — than just her. Throughout the novel, we get “song” chapters told in a collective ancestral voice. They tell the story of Ailey’s ancestors, starting with the Muscogee Creek people who originally lived on land that’s now Georgia, then enslaved people, then tenant farmers, to today. We also get sections dedicated to Ailey’s mother and sister. The breadth and depth of the novel is absolutely incredible, and I feel like I came to know all these people so intimately. The focus, throughout, is on the women; those who faced it all and endured.
It’s not always an easy read, nor would I expect it to be. There’s a lot of trauma — both generational and personal — and I encourage you to check trigger warnings. My heart broke for all of these characters; I encourage you to seek out reviews by Black and Indigenous readers for more on the impact and weight of the reading experience.
Could this book have been shorter? Well, probably, but I’m glad it wasn’t. I love books that dive so intimately into all of its characters that you feel you really know them. Even though it was 800 pages, I feel like it could have gone on forever. In fact, I caught myself musing about what would happen next after I’d already finished it, and had to remind myself there was no more!
Finally, I read large swaths of this one via audiobook, and the narration was beautifully done. While the prose is beautiful and transportive, it’s also strong and self-assured enough to translate all of its power when spoken aloud — in keeping with the style and talent of Black storytellers throughout history.
I encourage you to read this one — whether you make your way through it quickly or a bit at a time over a long time, it will be worth it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Drug abuse, Drug use, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Slavery, and Colonisation
Moderate: Miscarriage, Misogyny, Racism, Grief, Abortion, and Death of parent
annreadsabook's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
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
What a sweeping work of art this novel is. It is an epic, a eulogy to those who came before us, an ode to Black women. It is profoundly Southern, and profoundly Black.
The book takes its readers through different timelines: one beginning with the people from whom this land was stolen--Indigenous peoples--and the other beginning with Ailey Pearl Garfield and her family in the 80s. The writing is effortlessly poetic, and the journey into a past that, as Ailey will come to realize, is both intriguing and riddled with pain, is one that I will never forget. And while we see both men and women in Ailey's family history, this book is particularly a love song to Black women. There are, importantly, more than subtle nods to the likes of Kimberlé Crenshaw (one of Ailey's classmates quips: "When have white women ever looked out for [Black women]?"), and Ailey herself grows into her understanding of feminism, of Black woman-ism.
On a personal note, I felt so deeply immersed in Ailey's family partially because I saw and felt so much of my own Black family on these pages. I was brought back to holidays spent South with my extended family, rooms full of food and laughter, and being called, to this day, "baby" by my elder loved ones despite no longer being a child. I can't emphasize enough how eerily timely this novel is within the frame of my own life. My own family, descended from enslaved people in what we now call the United States on both sides, has within the past couple of years begun to dig through our history, a uniquely challenging task (both logistically and emotionally) for individuals descended from enslaved people.
What I wouldn't give to go back and read this again for the first time.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Death, Pedophilia, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Slavery, and Grief
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