Book Review: An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

Roy and Celestial are a young African-American couple only recently married when Roy is wrongfully imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit.

“Much of life is timing and circumstance, I see that now.”
This was our read of choice in September for the book club in work and we had a really interesting discussion yesterday about it - whilst indulging in some homemade brownies. I feel like book club is making me evaluate and analyse my reads more intensely than if I had just read them on my own. Our discussion actually made me appreciate this book more!

My initial criticism of this one was that I just didn’t really connect to, or like any of the characters - which is fine, this isn’t always necessary - but in hindsight, I feel like this shows how human and real Jones’ characters are. Everyone is flawed, we all have complex and complicated relationships with family members, with partners etc. And marriage just isn’t easy - I guess it just makes this story feel more rooted in real life.

An American Marriage has a strong message without coming across as preachy or smacking you over the head with it! Jones really leaves it up to the reader to sit back and consider the effect that a wrongful imprisonment can have on an individual, particularly when it comes to an African American male. Similar to my experience of reading Americanah earlier in the year, these types of stories really open my eyes to current racial issues and I do find them to be quite educational for me!

That being said, I personally didn’t love this one. I thought it started off really strongly - with the story being told through letters exchanged back and forth between Celestial and Roy
in jail, but when it changed to a normal narrative being told from the perspective of three different people, it lost a bit of its shine.

However, the writing was flawless and I felt like Jones handled the topic and themes wonderfully. A bit of a mixed bag for me, but I will certainly check out more of her work! 3 stars.

Johann
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