661 reviews for:

All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake

Tiya Miles

4.12 AVERAGE

bookswithboo's review against another edition

3.5

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

wilkese17's review against another edition

4.0

challenging emotional informative reflective sad

clarbineds's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

emmag1995's review against another edition

4.75

challenging dark hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

jiao_li's review against another edition

2.25

dark hopeful inspiring slow-paced

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery

jenmangler's review against another edition

4.0

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If you're expecting the story of Rose, Ashley, and Ruth, you'll be disappointed by this book. There is very little historical information about these three women, especially Rose and Ashley, so we can't really know them. But this book is a fascinating look at the lives of enslaved women, how they built lives for themselves and their families, and how they made meaning and preserved their stories. Ashley's sack is a heartbreaking artifact, and Ruth's embroidered story of the sack takes my breath away.

nadia's review against another edition

2.5

challenging informative reflective sad slow-paced

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I was so excited for this book. I thought it might end up being my favourite out of the Women's Prize Nonfiction shortlist. The concept intrigued me!

Alas, I'm so incredibly sad to report that I found this book incredibly hard to get through. I really struggled. The book read like an academic paper, with a lot of repetition and conjecture. This speculative style of history just didn't work for me. I felt so detached from the central characters of the book because of it.

I'm especially sad that I didn't like All That She Carried given the important subject matter. I wanted to rate this book higher just because of the topic, but given my reading experience I just couldn't.

Final Women's Prize 2024 Non-Fiction Shortlist rankings:

1. How to Say Babylon
2. Code Dependent
3. A Flat Place  
4. Thunderclap
5. Doppelganger
6. All That She Carried

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Slavery

hphillips91's review against another edition

2.5

reflective slow-paced

knitterscasket's review against another edition

5.0

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective

b_is_a_reading's review against another edition

3.75

challenging informative reflective