Homegoing

trade paperback, 305 pages

English language

Published April 18, 2017 by Vintage Books.

ISBN:
978-1-101-97106-2
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OCLC Number:
989489858

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3 stars (2 reviews)

Ghana, eighteenth century: two half sisters are born into different villages, each unaware of the other. One will marry an Englishman and lead a life of comfort in the palatial rooms of the Cape Coast Castle. The other will be captured in a raid on her village, imprisoned in the very same castle, and sold into slavery.

Homegoing follows the parallel paths of these sisters and their descendants through eight generations: from the Gold Coast to the plantations of Mississippi, from the American Civil War to Jazz Age Harlem. Yaa Gyasi’s extraordinary novel illuminates slavery’s troubled legacy both for those who were taken and those who stayed—and shows how the memory of captivity has been inscribed on the soul of our nation. --back cover

22 editions

Review of 'Homegoing' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This was not what I was expecting. I had been putting it off because even though everyone loved it, I had gotten the impression that this was a heavy literary novel. It isn't that at all. It is pretty standard historical fiction. (That's a good thing in my world.)

Two half-sisters in Ghana start the story. One stays in Ghana and marries a British man. The other is sold into slavery by that British man. One member of each generation tells their story up until the present.

Everyone is right. It really is good. Go read it.

Review of 'Homegoing' on 'Import'

1 star

Not sure if I'm missing something (the reviews are all good), but the prose and character development in these linked stories offered nothing for me. The stories are connected, one generation to the next, from the history of the gold coast slave trade to modern America, but each trudges along with an aimlessness and a lack of involvement that is frustrating to read. The dialogue lacked reality, and crafted badly drawn stereotypes instead of individuals. The history of this era is more engaging and interesting to read than this is, in novel/short story form.