courtneyajw 's review for:

Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi

5.0

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Gifty is stuck in a grief cycle. From the moment she becomes conscious of her relationship with her mother, to her father leaving, to the death of her brother, to her ongoing caretaking of her mother while trying to create her own life and profession. She’s grieving her own potential, her inability to see past the thick vail of religion, the things she can’t unclench or relinquish control of, without realizing it I also think she’s grieving relationships she’s too guarded to nurture.

This book is a dissertation on grief and the process of reconciling with yourself. Gifty is still Gifty in the end but she’s learned how to harness her good and her bad and how operate even under the heaviness of her grief.

This book does not alleviate the tension between a religious life and a science based one. Honestly, I’m not convinced that Gifty even realizes she needs to consider the tension that exists there until someone else points it out to her. But none of that is the point. She’s not going to solve centuries long debates and proclaim a right side and a wrong side. She’s just trying not to let the grief and responsibility of living pull her into an abyss.