Reviews with content warning for Physical abuse - Sing, Unburied, Sing

I read this for my college freshman English course and found myself looking forward to the class discussions on the book. I’d describe it as Song of Solomon meets the Odyssey, this book is a generation spanning ghost story and a fascinating character study.

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mscalls's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense 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? Yes

4.5

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katie_brauer's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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mezzano's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Sing, Unburied, Sing is filled with complicated moments and perspectives. There are hearts full of hurt and pain in this novel, hurt which isn't wholly resolved or improved upon. In this story, the perspective rotates between family members, focusing mostly on main characters Jojo and Leonie. As Leonie travels with her children to pick up their father from a state penitentiary, the reader watches the narrative overlap between characters, highlighting how they have internalized past memories differently. The prose is absolutely beautiful, and creates a deeply described world rich with emotions of despair, hope, and longing. At times, the descriptions overwhelm the reader, allowing them to get lost in the same experiences and emotions the characters find themselves enduring. In short, this novel is sad, dark, and gripping.

Despite the numerous hardships the characters are enduring from family members dying of cancer, drug abuse, and child neglect, characters mostly remain static in this novel. When reading, it is easy to grow attached to Jojo--the older brother of Kayla who has grown up quickly in order to make up for his own mother's short-comings. He is fiercely protective of Kayla, and the love he has for his younger sister is obvious. It is this love which lightens an otherwise dark narrative.

This isn't to say that the only love that exists in the novel is between Jojo and his sister. Mam and Pop, Leonie's parents, clearly love and do what they can to care for and prepare their grandchildren for the world they are facing. There is also an incredible amount of nuance in Leonie, Michael, and other more neglectful characters in Sing, Unburied, Sing. Leonie does not hate her children the way one might expect her to; she's a woman who is fighting her own grief and hardship while doing the very best she can. Even though her best will never be what her children need, she is trying to love them the only way she knows how. Michael also must come to terms with the fact his days incarcerated means that his children are separated from him far after he's left the walls that separate them. As he struggles to connect his life to his children's, he also makes mistakes which endanger his children, even though the result was unexpected from his perspective.

The strength of this novel is undoubtedly in Ward's beautiful way with language. In this story, few characters change for the better, but the ending still leaves the reader with hope. It is easy to be sucked into a world full of rich and musical language, and readers find themselves understanding perspectives they may have not been so tolerant of before reading. As the book progresses, painful memories of racism and hurt are shared between characters, leaving readers with the hope healing can finally take place for a family facing a series of complex hardships.

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Hate crime, Physical abuse, and Racism

Moderate: Cancer, Death, Grief, and Rape

Minor: Gore

The book's premise is that Leonie, the mother of Jojo and Kayla, take her children to pick up their father from prison. This story is messy, dark, and rife with present and past hardships. The only family Jojo seems to associate as one with love is with his grandparents Mam and Pop, who are his primary caretakers on a farm. Mam has cancer, leaving Pop to mostly run the property. More details about the rest of the content below. Note that this will undoubtedly include spoilers to the story.

Leonie is drug-addicted and the children's father is abusive and unable to recognize the extent of his own parent's unwavering racism. While Leonie goes on a road trip with her children, there are multiple instances of neglect influenced by ignorance and drug abuse. Multiple times, Jojo describes his mother as someone who hits her children. As the story continues after Michael (the childrens' father) is picked up from prison, more instances of drug abuse, physical abuse, and child abuse occur. Eventually, the father convinces Leonie to drive the children to see his side of the family, hopeful his parents will change their racist ways when they see that their grandchildren have aged. This is not the case, exposing Leonie and her mixed children to racist remarks and microaggressions. After this occurs, the children come home to their mother's side of the family, where Mam dies of cancer. Throughout the story, Pop and other characters also discuss death, in particular, the death of Leonie's brother and the circumstances that surround that instance (which are entrenched in racism). This often resurges in stories and feelings of the paranormal. There are also mentions of a very descriptive animal butchering in the beginning of the book, a mention of the rape of a young woman as past hurts are resurfaced in stories the characters describe to Jojo.

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