A wrenchingly difficult read, brilliant but brutal. Told in three voices, two living and one dead, the narrative explores the lives of three living generations of a fractured family in rural Mississippi. Leonie, the middle generation, is a black woman whose white husband is currently serving time at Parchman. She is often strung out on drugs, unable to be any kind of mother, while her 14-year-old son JoJo tends to his little sister Kayla. JoJo’s is the first voice we hear-- he is the heart and soul of this novel. We soon learn that he hears and sees things that others do not, a genetic gift or curse. It is apparent that Leonie’s parents, Pop and Mam, have been JoJo’s main caregivers for some time when the story begins. Now Mam is dying, Leonie is obsessed with the imminent release of her husband Michael from the prison farm, and JoJo is shouldering more and more responsibility. In addition, he is communicating with the shade of a dead boy his grandfather knew long ago during his own stretch at Parchman. Pop has told parts of Richie’s story to JoJo over and over...but he has never finished it. Richie is in limbo because he doesn’t know his own ending, and he begs JoJo to get Pop to fill in the final details. Nothing about the story generates hope that things will ever be better. The realism is hard to face, and I needed breaks to get through it. The grinding poverty, a mother's disregard for her children's welfare, the inhumane treatment of prisoners (both past and present), beleaguered ghosts and the protracted suffering of an old woman. When I push through that kind of difficult reading, I hope for some illumination of why people behave that way, what makes it possible for victims and survivors to endure such a life...maybe even a clue as to how changes in attitude and behavior might come about. I got very little of that from this book, and yet I am better for having read it, somehow. No one gets a pass from the author here...not her characters and not her readers, but it is impossible to miss the message that there IS love in this family. JoJo would endure almost anything to comfort and protect Kayla; Pop is attentive to his wife and a decent father figure for JoJo; Leonie rouses herself to fulfill her mother’s last wish for help in contacting the voodoo gods she believes will open the door to the next world for her; Michael defies his own uncompromising family in allegiance to Leonie and his children. This is not an uplifting tale of overcoming obstacles; rather it is an unsparing look at how insurmountable the obstacles can be. (read less)

A wrenchingly difficult read, brilliant but brutal. Told in three voices, two living and one dead, the narrative explores the lives of three living generations of a fractured family in rural Mississippi. Leonie, the middle generation, is a black woman whose white husband is currently serving time at Parchman. She is often strung out on drugs, unable to be any kind of mother, while her (read more)

This novel is a masterpiece like Beloved by Toni Morrison, from one of the strongest writers alive today. There is a character who is incredibly difficult to sympathize with, the apotheosis of who our culture tells us to hate and shame, but by the end, you at least understand her wounds. There is much more to the novel, which centers around a road trip by a young mother and her neglected children to pick their father up on freedom day from a prison with a brutal history. It is a thriller, a lyrical poem like the Odyssey, a ghost story, folk horror, a tragedy and a coming of age all in one. (read less)

This novel is a masterpiece like Beloved by Toni Morrison, from one of the strongest writers alive today. There is a character who is incredibly difficult to sympathize with, the apotheosis of who our culture tells us to hate and shame, but by the end, you at least understand her wounds. There is much more to the novel, which centers around a road trip by a young mother and her neglected (read more)