This is the first novel I have read by Toni Morrison. I saw the movie Beloved but it seemed too dark and depressing for me at the time. Maybe I might feel different now.
I found a copy of this book at Half Price Books, and thought I should try to read at least one Toni Morrison book before dismissing the author completely based on a movie. It turned out to be quite an interesting read – descriptive of the “Bottom” – this town that the blacks had inhabited; funny at times; language fitting the times and expressing things in a way that only those words could express; odd splattering of characters; the friendship of these two little girls Nel and Sula, that grows as they grow older and realize they are different and not as singular as they once thought they were; the paths that they take in life and the sprinkling of the townspeople who are also a major part of the book – they act as one moving character, defining the Bottom.
Very raw and matter of fact at times, yet leading the reader to draw their own conclusions about their own reactions to the unfolding story. Written as bits and pieces of memories stitched together in time, it jumps back and forth a bit but not hard to follow along. The characters are funny, real, contradictory. The segregation of blacks and how the blacks themselves viewed it; the segregation even amongst themselves, when they shun and almost fear Sula when she returns to the Bottom after having been gone for 10 years is an interesting dynamic to think about.
Each woman suffers from her own failings as much as from the expectations of others, and not one of them is able to salvage much from the ashes of her sacrifices. – taken from a review on Amazon but it described what I wanted to say so well, so I used it.
All in all, a good read.
