A review by bites_of_books
Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Transcendent Kingdom beautifully weaves science, religion, and the struggles with grief and addiction. We follow Gifty, a woman who is nearing the end of her PhD in neuroscience, focused on addiction research. In her lab she experiments with mice, making them addicted to Ensure and then testing to see which neurons are responsible for that behavior. At home, she cares for her mother who is in a deep depressive state. Her brother, Nana, died from a drug addiction that started from an OxyContin prescription after an ankle injury, so her research is very much tied to trying to understand why and how her brother became addicted and why he couldn't get out of that toxic cycle. To add to the complexity of this story, there is the religious background that Gifty grew up in. Her mother is deeply religious and instilled that belief in her from childhood. Gifty has journals filled with letters to God as she tried to process what was happening to her family when she was a child. 

All in all, this book is beautiful and heartbreaking. The ways that Gifty's family came together and broke apart are handled so carefully and tenderly that I was able to go through it with Gifty while maintaining a safe distance from that pain. I appreciate Gyasi's writing a lot and so far, both of her books have been excellent in my eyes, she's becoming an auto-buy author for me. I highly recommend this book but do check out the content warnings since it can be a difficult read for multiple reasons. 
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