The Book of Harlan

Alternating between different characters' perspectives and spanning roughly 60 years, this book ultimately reaches its turning point at the end of the book and felt like things tied up too quickly. It's a thought-provoking yet accessible piece of literary fiction, and the book flew by.

This is a terrific book, a sweeping story of one American black man's life in the twentieth century. It starts in Georgia, moves to Harlem and Kansas City, then Paris before the war and somewhere much darker during it, before returning to the US. It's an easy read - the sentences almost fall off the page into your head - but it's a powerful one. It'd be an easy five stars, if it wasn't for one slip right at the very end, with a coincidence I just found too unbelievable (assuming it was real, and not just in Harlan's mind...). Nevertheless, very highly recommended.