I did The Thing again where I was traveling and I read all the books and now I have to review them in a jumble. Thankfully, I’m starting with one that was absolutely brilliant and I will definitely not confuse with anything else. Let’s hit the ground running, y’all. Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad is a story of an escape from slavery, exceptionally true-to-life except for a significant ‘what if’: what if the Underground Railroad was an actual goddamn underground railroad? Like with tracks and trains […]
A worthy literary endeavor that left me underwhelmed
Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Underground Railroad, was another Mocha Girls Read book club selection. The novel follows Cora on her Odyssey-like journey to escape slavery traveling a magical realistic underground railroad. “Here was the true Great Spirit, the divine thread connecting all human endeavor – if you can keep it, it is yours. Your property, slave or continent. The American imperative.” – page 80 It begins in Africa following the first slaves as they were stolen and brought over to America. From […]
Slavery and “freedom” in the new world
There has been a lot of buzz surrounding The Underground Railroad (2016) by Colson Whitehead. It was, of course, on my most-used book list this year: NPR’s Best Books of 2016. But just in case that’s not enough, it also won the Pulitzer Price and the National Book Award. I’d heard a little bit about it before reading it, and I have to say I wasn’t sold on it. A real underground railroad during slavery? I couldn’t understand why Whitehead would feel the need to add that fantastical […]
Historical Fiction that Feels Real
Best for: People who like good, intense writing and want a bit more insight into slavery in the U.S. In a nutshell: Cora escapes the plantation she is enslaved on and faces more challenges and danger. Line that sticks with me: “Truth was a changing display in a shop window, manipulated by hands when you weren’t looking, alluring and ever out of reach.” Why I chose it: It’s been on my shelf for a few months; my visiting brother-in-law suggested it was a good book […]
In America the quirk was that people were things.
Social justice warrior alert: this was a really tough one, and also should be mandatory reading. I grew up in Canada, and stories about the American Civil War and the Underground Railroad have always been fairly romantic to me: good and caring citizens resisted the status quo and helped shuttle slaves from town to town until they were safely out of harm’s way in the North, often fabulous Canada where we were the cooler (haha) neighbor, and where former slaves could habeas their own damn […]
The Underground Railroad, Literally
This was a complicated read for me. On one hand I appreciated the style of writing. I was able to disappear into the plot and the characters. I could tear through page after page and not feel the time pass. On the other hand I wonder if people know that this isn’t a historically accurate book? Colson Whitehead takes us on a journey from a plantation in Georgia to…wherever Cora, the protagonist ends up. At first the book seems like it’s going to be similar […]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- Next Page »