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A review by julies_reading
Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward
4.0
Jojo is a 13 year old mixed boy. Normally, his Black grandparents would take care of him and his 3 year old sister, but his grandmother is dying of cancer, so his chronically absent mother is in charge, and has decided to bring the two of them with her to pick up their father from prison. But this family is haunted by its past, figuratively and literally.
I picked this up on a whim because the audio had no wait at my library, but also because of the NYT Top 100 list - Jesmyn Ward was the only author to appear three separate times, so I thought it was time to finally read her stuff.
I definitely understand why Ward is so lauded. This book packs so much into less than 300 pages. I was so surprised how many topics this covers, to different levels of subtlety. We talk about generational trauma, the prison and justice system, drug use and how it affects a family, racism, and police brutality among others. The speculative element tied very well into what is otherwise a very realistic, gritty story, and absolutely warrants the Morrison comparison. The setting and atmosphere of the sweltering South was well-done. Possibly the most successful part of this was how it complexly characterizes everyone we see. Leonie, the mother, is a drug addict who has basically abandoned her children. She literally neglects to feed her children and worse, but has no problem going to lengths for drugs, and then is jealous of her 13 year old son for having a better relationship with her daughter. But we still feel empathy for her and all she's gone through, and want her to be better! SeeingJojo and Kayla go through this trip is entirely harrowing on multiple levels and can be hard to watch. However, my main detractor from this book was that it felt like not a lot happened. I could've used more plot, but also felt like we could have seen even more from all of our characters and gotten more resolution. Everything in the book was good, but I felt like there was more to go through.
On a side note, I wouldn't recommend the audiobook. One of the narrators in the first half of the book consistently drops in volume for every sentence, whispering by the end of it so it's hard to hear. It's not there in the second half, but it was enough to really frustrate me.
Overall, this is a great literary fiction that covers lots of thematic ground. I'd highly recommend it although I wish there was a little bit more plot.
I picked this up on a whim because the audio had no wait at my library, but also because of the NYT Top 100 list - Jesmyn Ward was the only author to appear three separate times, so I thought it was time to finally read her stuff.
I definitely understand why Ward is so lauded. This book packs so much into less than 300 pages. I was so surprised how many topics this covers, to different levels of subtlety. We talk about generational trauma, the prison and justice system, drug use and how it affects a family, racism, and police brutality among others. The speculative element tied very well into what is otherwise a very realistic, gritty story, and absolutely warrants the Morrison comparison. The setting and atmosphere of the sweltering South was well-done. Possibly the most successful part of this was how it complexly characterizes everyone we see. Leonie, the mother, is a drug addict who has basically abandoned her children. She literally neglects to feed her children and worse, but has no problem going to lengths for drugs, and then is jealous of her 13 year old son for having a better relationship with her daughter. But we still feel empathy for her and all she's gone through, and want her to be better! SeeingJojo and Kayla go through this trip is entirely harrowing on multiple levels and can be hard to watch. However, my main detractor from this book was that it felt like not a lot happened. I could've used more plot, but also felt like we could have seen even more from all of our characters and gotten more resolution. Everything in the book was good, but I felt like there was more to go through.
On a side note, I wouldn't recommend the audiobook. One of the narrators in the first half of the book consistently drops in volume for every sentence, whispering by the end of it so it's hard to hear. It's not there in the second half, but it was enough to really frustrate me.
Overall, this is a great literary fiction that covers lots of thematic ground. I'd highly recommend it although I wish there was a little bit more plot.