2024 the best songs of 2024 review

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INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

AN OPRAH BOOK CLUB SELECTION

LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION • A FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR FICTION • SHORTLISTED FOR THE CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE • LONGLISTED FOR THE ASPEN WORDS LITERARY PRIZE

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year • A Washington Post 10 Best Books of the Year • A Oprah Daily Top 20 Books of the Year • A BookPage Best Fiction Book of the Year • A Booklist 10 Best First Novels of the Year • A Kirkus 100 Best Novels of the Year • A Parade Pick • A Chicago Public Library Top 10 Best Books of the Year

An Instant Washington Post, USA Today, and Indie Bestseller

"Epic…. I was just enraptured by the lineage and the story of this modern African-American family…. A combination of historical and modern story—I’ve never read anything quite like it. It just consumed me." —Oprah Winfrey, Oprah Book Club Pick

An Indie Next Pick • A New York Times Book Everyone Will Be Talking About • A People 5 Best Books of the Summer • A Good Morning America 15 Summer Book Club Picks • An Essence Best Book of the Summer • A Time 11 Best Books of the Month • A Washington Post 10 Books of the Month • A CNN Best Book of the Month • A Ms. Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Goodreads Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A BookPage Writer to Watch • A USA Today Book Not to Miss • A Chicago Tribune Summer Must-Read • An Observer Best Summer Book • A Millions Most Anticipated Book • A Ms. Book of the Month • A Well-Read Black Girl Book Club Pick • A BiblioLifestyle Most Anticipated Literary Book of the Summer • A Deep South Best Book of the Summer • Winner of an AudioFile Earphones Award

The 2020 NAACP Image Award-winning poet makes her fiction debut with this National Book Award-longlisted, magisterial epic—an intimate yet sweeping novel with all the luminescence and force of Homegoing; Sing, Unburied, Sing; and The Water Dancer—that chronicles the journey of one American family, from the centuries of the colonial slave trade through the Civil War to our own tumultuous era.

The great scholar, W. E. B. Du Bois, once wrote about the Problem of race in America, and what he called “Double Consciousness,” a sensitivity that every African American possesses in order to survive. Since childhood, Ailey Pearl Garfield has understood Du Bois’s words all too well. Bearing the names of two formidable Black Americans—the revered choreographer Alvin Ailey and her great grandmother Pearl, the descendant of enslaved Georgians and tenant farmers—Ailey carries Du Bois’s Problem on her shoulders.

Ailey is reared in the north in the City but spends summers in the small Georgia town of Chicasetta, where her mother’s family has lived since their ancestors arrived from Africa in bondage. From an early age, Ailey fights a battle for belonging that’s made all the more difficult by a hovering trauma, as well as the whispers of women—her mother, Belle, her sister, Lydia, and a maternal line reaching back two centuries—that urge Ailey to succeed in their stead.

To come to terms with her own identity, Ailey embarks on a journey through her family’s past, uncovering the shocking tales of generations of ancestors—Indigenous, Black, and white—in the deep South. In doing so Ailey must learn to embrace her full heritage, a legacy of oppression and resistance, bondage and independence, cruelty and resilience that is the story—and the song—of America itself.

From the Publisher

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08F7RSXPD
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harper (August 24, 2021)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ August 24, 2021
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 3368 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 801 pages
Reviewer: SESTORYWOMAN
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: I wish this book had been longer’
Review: I finished one of my favorite novels from this year yesterday just in time for the Winter Solstice. The book is “The Love Songs of W. E. B. Du Bois” by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers and is her debut novel although she is a celebrated poet.This novel traces the history of a young woman, Ailey Pearl Garfield. It starts with the land and a mysterious mound, a medicine mound in a Creek village. The book gives voice to different people in the long history of Ailey’s family. She has been raised in a city in Georgia but each summer her family returns to Chicasetta, a small place in the country where Ailey’s family has lived since the very beginnings of slavery.There are many shadows in Ailey’s story: whispers of sexual abuse, drug use, and coming to terms with her own identity.Ultimately Ailey begins to research her family history as she pursues a doctorate in history. Despite encountering many roadblocks from the white people in her path, she is determined to unravel the myriad stories that have made her who she is.I can’t do this book justice. It’s nearly 800 pages long but I wanted it to be even longer. The characterization was superb and the historical details were well nigh perfect. Ailey—and her family—have such strong voices. I enjoyed reading the revelations from the people who inhabited the land in Chicasetta even though the details of the lives of enslaved people were dark and often sordid. But that is as it should be because that is what happened to African Americans and different Native American tribes. And it still goes on today.This is a book of great beauty and significance. I treasure it.

Reviewer: Aimee Pollak
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: an epic story that spans 100s of years - difficult read, but worth the effort
Review: A real review would take many pages. But in short, this story helps recapture the history of a piece of the land in a place (now called Georgia) by tracing the heritage of one young woman. It was enthralling and devastating. There is a significant amount of child sexual abuse - I wonder if that was partially to give any reader the same feeling of revulsion that the main character feels when researching the history of slavery. I was left feeling like I had a better understanding of the full atrocity of slavery (not that I didn’t know that it was horrific and barbaric, but now I also felt it in my heart and soul in a new way). A powerful testament to the strength it takes to survive adversity. Also a very interesting meditation on the way people interpret skin color to have some deeper meaning.

Reviewer: Reader6647
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Good book with excellent prose
Review: This is a very well written book that kept me interested to the end. I do love the generational story and the characters. It is written like a bunch of smaller stories with different characters as the center, but it's all pulled together by one central character, Ailey. I found the family tree to be a bit complicated and the break out at the front did help to keep things straight. I did not like the ending. It seemed a bit rushed to me and I wonder if certain parts in the middle could have been cut to give some time to really flesh out a good ending for this story. I will love to read more of author's work.

Reviewer: Kindle Customer
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: A Story You Can Curl Up And Get Lost In!
Review: Brilliantly written. The author is a published poet and it shows in this work. 800+ pages of deliciously written fiction through several generations. I don't agree with any of the negative reviews. The story is constructed so that everything makes sense and is in context...no gratuitous rape scenes or violence. These things happened historically and still do in families. I loved the strong women and their fully fleshed out personalities and the dialogue is priceless. A very beautiful book and well worth the time to read and enjoy it!

Reviewer: O. Merce Brown
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Re: Book Quality and Deckle Edge, Answering Numerous Reports of Problems UPDATED w/REVIEW
Review: *****I have just begun to read this book today--when it arrived--and wanted to address the quality of the book and the deckle edge. Many people are "reviewing" this wonderful novel by rating it low and complaining about "the poor quality" of the book and the paper, stating that they've never seen anything like it before.The book is simply produced with a "deckle edge", which is a rough, untidy, rugged edge. Many books, both hardback and paperback, of today and of years ago, are made with this type of page edge on the right and left edges of the book. I am guessing that the critics have not seen this before. It is not the prettiest deckle, as I think it is a little tiny bit rough, but if so many people hadn't complained, I'd never have noticed it. It looks like it was intended to be that way. I personally love a deckle edge like this.The paper quality is wonderful and doesn't feather or bleed through when highlighted or underlined in regular ballpoint pen.I do think that it is as nice as any other hardback I've purchased, and not defective or inferior!I have only begun to read this, and will edit this "review" with an actual review of the novel later when I finish it. I just didn't think it fair to this marvelously talented author that people look at the reviews (of which there are 14 as of the time of this writing) and see extremely low reviews--when there are just simply quite a few people unfamiliar with both deckle edges and the evaluation of paper quality!Also, all of the pagination seems fine. It appears that some people are believing that they are experiencing rather strange problems. This appears to me to be a fine hardback book, and actually quite a good value considering the number of pages and the quality of the writing so far.UPDATE: 10 days later...*****The first thing I want to recommend about this book is that people purchase the hardback version. The reason is that in the process of learning about all of the characters here, the reader keeps referring back to the genealogy of the ancestors in the front of the book. So many times. I know this sounds like a huge hassle, but it is NOT—it is a part of understanding a whole community of ancestors, and it is necessary to really understand the many, many facets of their story.Also I looked back again and again at the chapters in the table of contents that were flashbacks in time for reference. Of course you can do this with an e-reader but it is much more cumbersome. This is a precious story, one that I will read and re-read, and it is one that I keep notes in and want to refer back to. I know that this can be done as well with a Kindle, but it is different, and I strongly prefer a physical hardback book. Think of your favorite book ever, and if you want that to be in a hardback form, you want this one to be the same.I read this book in ten days and it was a beautiful adventure, one that I wished would never end. It is the story of not just of a woman (though it is that too), but the story of a people—all of the main character’s ancestors too. All those who came before her. The main character’s story cannot be understood apart from them. In reading this story, I came to experience this in a very profound way—how we are all connected to those who came before us, and how they all are a very real part of us now. Of course, I would have said that I recognized this before I read the book, but now I understand this in a really visceral way as well.This book is a portal into seeing a part of a people’s experience that I could not experience any other way. Not just African Americans, but Native Americans and White people too, in a way that is raw and real and impactful, because of the pain, cruelty, humanness, kindness, and familial love that permeates this novel.I want to give a trigger warning as this book reflects the reality of harsh living in the early part of our country’s history, including stories of abuse and violations of all types. None of it is gratuitous though, and much of the details are left to the imagination, expressed as people of that time would if they were sharing it with others.The novel takes place for the most part in Chicasetta, Georgia, and follows many generations of the people who lived there. It is inclusive in that it enables the readers to witness the thoughts, decisions, and justifications of many loving actions and even more horrendous and grotesque actions. In other words, it is a human experience for this time in history. I felt like I entered into a place that would be closed off to me because of time, race, and geography. I felt privileged to hear these precious stories. Even though this is fiction, I do think that the stories are familiar and common to so many families of that time. And to those alive now, too.I just finished now this book and am so sad to leave these characters behind. I cannot imagine anyone regretting purchasing this book, and investing hours in reading it, gaining the privilege of participating in a world view that this so comprehensive that they’d never be invited it into otherwise. I feel like I’ve had a vital glimpse into what Black people and Native Americans have experienced, and White people too—one that I could gain in no other way.Highest recommendation, one of my favorite books, ever.*****

Reviewer: libravt54
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: unbelievable recounting of a significant period of our history .
Review: This was an incredible book that I wanted to continue. So much was revealed about bloodlines, mixed heritage and the intersection between Native Americans, African American and the oppression of the white people. So much pain and suffering in the name of white supremacy. It makes me wonder what we have truly learned, if anything, from these historic stories.

Reviewer: Ana
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Un libro de ficción histórica donde vamos a conocer a Ailey y sus ancestros.El libro está contado en dos tiempos y a lo largo de la historia vamos brincando del pasado al presente.Un libro con temas de racismo, esclavitud, abuso y feminismo.¡Muchos personajes!

Reviewer: Jane Sujer
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Showed the historical aspect of the white man taking from the Indigenous people and their treatment of African Americans. Also the importance of the colour of one's skin! Excellently tied the past to the present through flashback chapters!

Reviewer: Shakespeareandme
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: This novel is a remarkable, compelling, immersive Black feminist history of southern America. Though fiction, it is brilliantly researched, delivering a profound meditation on American history, with characters who live on beyond the page. It’s utterly moving and an honour to read. I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Reviewer: Dr. Gerhard Tiefenbacher
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Ein 800 Seiten starker Roman, der viel zu kurz ist. Ich hätte gerne noch weitergelesen.

Reviewer: a.khare
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Books with a hefty page count have a very daunting task. They have to be brilliant and keep your undivided attention or be mediocre. Jeffers manages to keep you engaged page after page with her beautifully written characters. This is historical fiction at its best. The impact of the brutal exploitation of the native Indians and the black people on the mindsets of the current generation is well documented. It is not a easy task to write a synopsis of this book as there are several characters. At times it got confusing for me and I had to keep going to and fro between the pages. Though the cast of characters is giving before the first chapter I would suggest making your own notes or chart them out according to your sensibilities.Do not be daunted by its size, take a deep breath and dive in!