Reviews - Paradise | The StoryGraph

735 reviews for:

Paradise

Toni Morrison

3.96 AVERAGE

lianneponferrada's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

“How exquisitely human was the wish for permanent happiness, and how thin human imagination became trying to achieve it.”

Set in Ruby, a remote town founded by proud, racially pure men who triumphed against slavery, its foundations of piety and righteousness are not as stable as they seem after nine men brutally attack a convent regarding the moral purity of the residing women. Through rich descriptions and vivid flashbacks, Toni Morrison explores the complex lives of these women.

I was stunned by this book! The way Morrison submerges the reader into an intense narrative is breathtaking. Her complex modernist style demands the reader’s full attention, featuring flashbacks, sharp dialogue, and nuanced social commentary. Within Paradise, there are several emotionally rich narratives. The main women (Mavis, Grace, Divine, Patricia, Consolata, Lone, and Save-Marie) endure so much and are deeply flawed, but it’s wonderful seeing their relationships build. They relentlessly take care of each other, making character development almost inevitable and coming about naturally. Though their tales are traumatic, each woman’s loving encounter is heartwarming, serving as a grounding presence within these rigorous narratives.

The rural, all-black town offers opportunities for nuanced social commentary, highlighting the dangers of separatism and the inescapability of social hierarchies. The unique Christian imagery sympathetically illustrates the complex reality of faith. Morrison consistently employs sharp remarks on misogyny, depicting women navigating the patriarchal standards inflicted by geography, Christianity, purity culture, colourism, and so on. This run-on list is only a testament to the complexity of Morrison’s social analysis!

This level of literary greatness comes with a cost. Within a single chapter, Morrison shifts into flashbacks, historic present tense, and intense world-building without warning, which is tricky to navigate. The poetic language is stunning but might be overly abstract for some. Paradise is the third book of the Beloved series, which I am yet to read, so I didn’t do myself (or Morrison) any favours in that respect. These perceived flaws are not her fault, but mine. As eager as I am to read more of her work, it is essential to reread it, perhaps studying it, so we can fully appreciate her genius.

Content Warnings

adalaiah's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Toni Morrison is a state of the art writer. You have to be familiar with the weird way she pushes you right into her stories, which tend to be circular and so falls into pieces as you reach the end. But Paradise was good in every way. Her critique of misogyny and patriarchy is immaculate. She asserts a very critical look on how a community believing in separatism can still perpetuates the same violence they seek to escape. And how black women never seem to win in any situation, still suffering forms of racism and colorism even amongst their own. It's a heartbreaking narrative but so powerful in its observation and dissection of human behaviors.

readwithrosalyn's review against another edition

3.75

This isn’t a book you just read it’s one you sit with. Morrison weaves a haunting portrait of a town built on trauma and tradition, and how that trauma seeps into every decision, every judgment, and every silence.

The women in this story are especially complex, each carrying a history that often isn’t theirs alone, but passed down or imposed. The result? A layered chorus of trauma response, retreat, rage, and self-erasure that strip so many characters of the ability to experience joy, freedom, or even connection. The town itself becomes a character: controlling, paranoid, and desperate to maintain an illusion of purity at the cost of humanity.

It’s not an easy read. It asks a lot from you emotionally, but that’s the brilliance of Morrison she doesn’t shy away from the hard truths. This book reminded me that trauma doesn’t just live in the past; it lives in the way people move, relate, protect, and punish. And if left unchecked, it becomes the foundation of entire communities.

xyzulater's review against another edition

3.0

challenging sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Long, difficult book to get into; I love Toni Morrison, but this was probably my least favorite of her books and I’ve read many. I mainly read it because it’s part of the Beloved “trilogy.”

songofsolomon's review against another edition

5.0

The hands that wrote this were blessed with a gift unlike any other

davidsmith0801's review against another edition

5.0

This is genuinely the greatest novel I've ever read in my entire life. I cannot recommend it enough.

athmysest's review against another edition

5.0

In my eyes, Beloved and The Bluest Eye establish Toni Morrison as the greatest author of all time. Paradise establishes her as a god.

A note- this book is grand. There are probably over a hundred characters, multiple settings, and the plot unfolds over decades. It is necessary for the story that Morrison is trying to tell, but it also makes the book difficult to read. Don't pick up this book unless you have time to live in it. I read it over the course of three sittings, and even that was pushing it! Any more, and I would have forgotten enough of the threads to damage my understanding of the book.

Don't let that deter you. Morrison utilizes the same magical realism as Beloved and The Bluest Eye in this book, except on a much wider scale, giving the novel a feeling of breadth and wonder and horror and mystery that I don't think I'll ever feel again.

11/10.