An American Marriage
Ratings212
Average rating3.9
A book where you root for and are mad at everyone. The characters are realistically flawed and understandable. I wanted impossible things for them. I'm aware that in real life, black men are targeted and abused by the system, and know all to well about impossible things, like regaining time lost and relationships devastated by separation and distance.
I also knew that darned tree would be imperiled at some point.
Here's what I knew coming into the book: it was an Oprah's Book Club pick, and it was about the consequences and effects on a marriage of a black man's interaction with a racist and unjust legal system. I wanted to remain open to what the book, and Tayari Jones had to say, but my expectations were tempered a little bit by the cynical baggage I brought to it. I did not think I needed a book to teach me that the legal system in this country is racist, I did not need a book to teach me that the personal consequences were devastating (do you hear the cliché of that word? Our cliches fail us: devastating, heart breaking, immense, incomprehensible. They all relate to a quantity so vast as to challenge human scale, but they're equally so vague as to be almost bloodless).
This wasn't that book, it's better than that.
This book asks difficult, almost despairing questions. What happens when injustice is as commonplace, as unbounded, as inhuman in scale as the weather? What's the point of shaking your fist at the weather? Roy is imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit, and once he has successfully appealed, the system may expunge his record and release him but it can never give him the the time lost, the life that he could have lived, back. Who pays him back for that time? It's not the state, and if it's not the state, then the only other people can pay are the people around him, but they've changed too.
It's the irreconcilable paradox of our prisons, the math that never penciled out in the first place. It's become so encumbered by history and politics and violence and profit that we delude ourselves into thinking that our reforms and incremental changes and civic religion of equality can fix it, but when you take it all away, the same conflict remains: if prisons are places of rehabilitation, at some point the prisoner becomes a different person than committed the crime. If prisons are places of retribution, who believes anymore that wasting years of human life does anything to mend what cannot be broken?
I loved the characters in this book. Not loved them in the sense of being good or likable people, I don't feel the need to judge them but nobody in the book is perfect. But Tayari Jones makes you believe in their dreams, believe that they are real, and that means that the painful realization that all of these dreams together did not add up was real too. Nobody was going to get exactly what they want, and even those that got most of what they want will have to live with the knowledge that some of it came from some pretty selfish choices.
The justice system, the whole legal system, is based on the ideas that everything is owned by someone, and when something is stolen, somebody has to pay. Except for the system itself. It never has to pay.
This emotional and thought-provoking read explores the boundaries of a new marriage and the extent of loyalty and responsibility when it comes to sacrificing one's best interest in favor of another's. It also explores the consequences of racial profiling, false imprisonment, and the emotional and mental toll this can have on a person ultimately destroying their life.
Every english class got 2-3 mid books and then one of the best pieces of literature you've ever read; this is the latter!
Starts out really well and has a lot of potential, but then just gets so boring. The characters aren't likeable nor do they develop much or have much depth. Plus the sexist marriage tropes throughout just get unbearable.
I found the novel engrossing, but the ending a little anti-climatic. Overall worth the read, very well written.
3.5 stars. I finished this one pretty quickly but I have a feeling I'll be thinking about it for a while yet.
It was an okayish book. I sympathized a lot with Roy and Celestial, but at the same time i couldnt understand the course and reason behind their actions. I found more chemistry between Roy and Celestial than Andre and Celestial which felt like a forced relationship. I cant really tell what to think about this book
Prompt #23 from 2020 Popsugar Challenge: A book that won an award in 2019; #8 from 2021 Popsugar Challenge: A book that has won the Women's Prize for Fiction
Book: An American Marriage Author: Tayari Jones Genre: domestic fiction Dates Read: 02/19/2021-02/25/2021 Format: Audiobook - Hoopla Other prompts: fresh starts, social justice, family tree, about an artist (doll maker), and BLM reading list Rating:
A quick read—-but very, very emotional. This author is not afraid of the realities of life and putting them into fiction.
Thoroughly enjoyed the writing even though I did not really like the main characters.
Very good plot, even story arch and emotional and conflicted characters. A heartwarming story of love and loss and all the things inbetween. Kept me guessing until the epilogue.
This story was intriguing, thought-provoking, and honest of how quickly someone's life can be derailed because of wrongful accusations. This is specifically true for men of color as prison statistics can attest. This book was a real human emotional journey and I loved the entire process of getting to the ending.
I only have one negative overall...
I have a giant pet peeve with multiple point of view stories when each character can not be distinguished by the tone or voice of the writing. If I stopped off in the middle of the chapter, I had to check back to see who I was reading because every character had the same phrasing and vocabulary. I know this is picky, but if you can't make the voices distinct, write in third person omniscient. Just sayin'~
Realistic and raw depiction of the ups and down of a relationship - specifically, marriage.
Excellent!!
I can't explain why I didn't pick up this book sooner. Perhaps, I just read the part of the summary focusing on marriage, which I didn't particularly want to read about when a relationship I had was failing.
However, the title came up in available audiobooks on Libby and I thought, why not? Not only was I not disappointed, I was drawn in. All of the characters in Tayari Jones' novel are real; these are real people with complex characters going through both every day life and major life events. Jones captures dialogue in a way few authors can. I found myself on both sides with each character, ultimately appreciating them for being human.
She has also written a story that a lot of Americans may not know firsthand; that of a man wrongfully convicted to a long sentence and what that does to his family. She uses letters to take the reader through exactly what each character experiences and how they change over time.
The ending was tough. At first, it seemed like Roy was going to be a victorious Odysseus, returning from a horrendous journey to his wife, but that was not to be.
The audiobook version is extremely well done with both voice performers capturing each character's nuances.
Engaging story, I like the varied perspectives. I appreciate the cultural/anti-racism perspective.
Roy Othaniel Hamilton and Celestial Gloriana are educated, middle-class professional on the come-up. They've been married for a year, and like most marriages it isn't perfect - they've still got their secrets. There's work to do yet but a lifetime ahead of them to do it, filled with promise and love.
And then one night at a hotel it's a case of a black man being at the wrong place at the wrong time and Roy finds himself looking at 12 years in prison.
Celestial and Roy write each other in that time. The small cracks in their marriage growing into massive fissures pushed to breaking. The epistolary framework allows each of them to present their case uninterrupted and you find yourself sympathizing with both and neither. It's an impossible situation. Jones wrote that she felt this was a novel in conversation with the Odyssey - of a man trying to get back to his wife.
Jones has got such an ear for language, you can hear the southern black lilt in their words and sympathize with the case each of them makes. In Jones' hands I'd listen to them argue over single payer vs universal healthcare and just as likely still not know who I sided with. Complicated and messy rendered with clear eyed perspective. (But yeah, the poor tree was a bit extra.)
This review can also be found on my blog.
I've struggled for days to write this review. An American Marriage is well-written and engaging and while I appreciate what Tayari Jones did with this book, I just felt so frustrated reading it. Roy, the husband in the couple at the center of the story, treats his wife Celestial like little more than property and at one point even tells her he could rape her if he wanted to. I felt like he was irredeemably awful at times to the point where I wanted to put down the book and not pick it up again. I wish I had loved this more and it certainly wasn't bad, but it also isn't something that I see sticking with me.
A man and woman marry. He's from working class origins. She comes from money. Each has his own problems in his family of origin. They struggle with issues. They love each other. They struggle more.
And then, seemingly out of nowhere, he is accused and convicted of rape. He is sent to prison. What will happen to their marriage?
I wavered and wavered on my rating of An American Marriage: A Novel by Tayari Jones. Chapter one left me breathless. Has anyone else really captured the dynamics of a marriage so well as Tayari Jones in chapter one? Five stars. I wasn't as pleased with the ensuing chapters, the time Roy spent in prison. Roy's time in prison and the reactions of his family and friends to his being in prison seemed muted. Three stars. And so my rating went, up and down, down and up, until I got to the very last page.
I don't want to share the ending, because a huge part of reading the book is to find out what happens to the marriage. There is also the bait of off-and-on wondering whether Roy did what he was accused of.
Still, despite my ambivalence about some of the parts of the story, overall, I'm very glad I read it.
This is one of the best book I've read recently. Wonderfully, powerfully written and beautifully constructed (a mix of first person narration and letters). Would recommend that everyone checks this one out