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A review by charlottekook
God Help the Child by Toni Morrison
4.0
i liked reading this, though found it quite different from her earlier work which i've read more of. it was quite refreshing to read contemporary references, and though it felt less powerful to me than her older works i think this is because it was more subtle.
near the start of the novel, i found myself thinking that it was unusual to read something written by morrison with a first person narrator integral to the story (rather than a distanced, first or third person narrator), though as soon as i thought this the narrative perspective changed. i like the switches between character, and the bookending of the novel by sweetness - who's actions loom over bride/lu ann for the whole novel - and it felt very authentically "morrison", taking the chair out from under you as soon as you had got comfortable with the narrative. the subject matter was often distressing, but this was always positioned as a memory - so a lot can be unpacked here about trauma, death, abuse and its impact on victims and bystanders. i feel like the novel is more complex than it lets on, which i would again put down to the subtlety and brilliance of morrison's writing.
it felt both similar and completely different from her other works formally (though thematically similar). with the novels of hers i've read (no means an exhaustive list), there always seems to be an element of detachment from events and a displacement of characters - the latter is more obvious here, but the second seems to be tackled formally for bride, with the use of her mother, "friend" and sofia's voice, as well as the third person view of bride, interjecting into her story and making us see her from a distance - frustratingly so as, like i said, it's unusual for a morrison novel to give us a character's first person thoughts. i also think that this fractured/split nature of the narrators, as well as the mirroring(?) with booker's story makes the aims of the novel/morrison more difficult to grasp. there is no resolution to the trauma and the outcome of the accusations so the message (and there always is a message with morrison) has to be picked over later.
the novel intrigued me more than it gave me enjoyment, but i love morrison because - and honestly do not want to be too cringe/corny - she makes you think.
near the start of the novel, i found myself thinking that it was unusual to read something written by morrison with a first person narrator integral to the story (rather than a distanced, first or third person narrator), though as soon as i thought this the narrative perspective changed. i like the switches between character, and the bookending of the novel by sweetness - who's actions loom over bride/lu ann for the whole novel - and it felt very authentically "morrison", taking the chair out from under you as soon as you had got comfortable with the narrative. the subject matter was often distressing, but this was always positioned as a memory - so a lot can be unpacked here about trauma, death, abuse and its impact on victims and bystanders. i feel like the novel is more complex than it lets on, which i would again put down to the subtlety and brilliance of morrison's writing.
it felt both similar and completely different from her other works formally (though thematically similar). with the novels of hers i've read (no means an exhaustive list), there always seems to be an element of detachment from events and a displacement of characters - the latter is more obvious here, but the second seems to be tackled formally for bride, with the use of her mother, "friend" and sofia's voice, as well as the third person view of bride, interjecting into her story and making us see her from a distance - frustratingly so as, like i said, it's unusual for a morrison novel to give us a character's first person thoughts. i also think that this fractured/split nature of the narrators, as well as the mirroring(?) with booker's story makes the aims of the novel/morrison more difficult to grasp. there is no resolution to the trauma and the outcome of the accusations so the message (and there always is a message with morrison) has to be picked over later.
the novel intrigued me more than it gave me enjoyment, but i love morrison because - and honestly do not want to be too cringe/corny - she makes you think.