2.83k reviews for:

Let Us Descend

Jesmyn Ward

3.86 AVERAGE

rhettharmon's review

4.0

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I could not put it down. Read it all on a Saturday.

hellomandamay's review

2.5

dark mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

matthewcpeck's review

5.0

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At the start, I wasn't sure about this novel - Ward's first not set in contemporary Mississippi - but my doubts were swiftly put to rest. It's another masterwork, narrated by Annis, an enslaved teenager in antebellum South Carolina, whose already-precarious life is upended when her mother is sold and taken south by "Georgia men" (All white characters are nameless). When Annis herself is sold, she is brought to New Orleans on a Dantean nightmare march, and ultimately brought to work in the house of a sugar plantation matriarch in conditions even worse what came before. All the while, Annis is visited by elemental spirits, chiefly a force of wind and rain that takes the form of her grandmother, the first of her ancestors to be stolen away to the U.S.

It's a lot, but Ward's writing is breathtaking. "Let Us Descend" is a dizzying combination of harrowing, sensory realism and metaphysical otherworldliness. Her writing is always poetic, but by the exhilarating and hopeful ending, it's on a whole other level. I get chills thinking about the last paragraph.

kaylasbooks992's review

3.0

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This was a new genre for me!! It took quite a bit to get into it. I felt like certain moments were very heartbreaking to read and I also felt like certain times I just did not plain understand the imagery and what was going on. Overall I did enjoy the book, but wished I had felt a little more connected to the myths/spirits that were present.

sarahmacri's review

4.25

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

kellyrfinn's review against another edition

2.0

challenging sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Loveable characters: Yes

hearmegrowl's review

5.0

challenging dark sad medium-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

suclaire's review against another edition

4.5

challenging dark emotional hopeful 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: No

emilyrosebooks's review

2.5

slow-paced

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I wanted to love this and the character, but I found the subject to be unfocused, and hard to follow the point of this story. The book opens with Annis doing combat moves with her mother that had been passed down for generations, but then she never uses these skills against her slaveholders. The theme of lost family, and generational suffering at the hands of slavery is interesting and the most poignant, but the spirits that are intertwined with the story, namely Aza, distract me from what I think is the more important and powerful story. There are definitely things worth dissecting in this book, but I really didn't love it. 

ashinoda's review

5.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative 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: No