An Untamed State
"Once you start this book, you will not be able to put it down. An Untamed State is a novel of hope intermingled with fear, a book about possibilities mixed with horror and despair. It is written at a pace that will match your racing heart, and while you find yourself shocked, amazed, devastated, you also dare to hope for the best, for all involved." --Edwidge Danticat, author of Breath, Eyes, Memory and The Dew Breaker
Roxane Gay is a powerful new literary voice whose short stories and essays have already earned her an enthusiastic audience. In An Untamed State, she delivers an assured debut about a woman kidnapped for ransom, her captivity as her father refuses to pay and her husband fights for her release over thirteen days, and her struggle to come to terms with the ordeal in its aftermath.
Mireille Duval Jameson is living a fairy tale. The strong-willed youngest daughter of one of Haiti's richest sons, she has an adoring husband, a precocious infant son, by all appearances a perfect life. The fairy tale ends one day when Mireille is kidnapped in broad daylight by a gang of heavily armed men, in front of her father's Port-au-Prince estate. Held captive by a man who calls himself "The Commander," Mireille waits for her father to pay her ransom. As it becomes clear her father intends to resist the kidnappers, Mireille must endure the torments of a man who resents everything she represents.
An Untamed State is a novel of privilege in the face of crushing poverty, and of the lawless anger that corrupt governments produce. It is the story of a willful woman attempting to find her way back to the person she once was, and of how redemption is found in the most unexpected of places. An Untamed State establishes Roxane Gay as a writer of prodigious, arresting talent.
"From the astonishing first line to the final scene, An Untamed State is magical and dangerous. I could not put it down. Pay attention to Roxane Gay; she's here to stay." --Tayari Jones, author of Silver Sparrow and Leaving Atlanta
"[Haiti's] better scribes, among them Edwidge Danticat, Franketienne, Madison Smartt Bell, Lyonel Trouillot, and Marie Vieux Chavet, have produced some of the best literature in the world. . . . Add to their ranks Roxane Gay, a bright and shining star." --Kyle Minor, author of In the Devil's Territory, on Ayiti
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Community Reviews
I also really liked that the main character never forgave her father because that would have been too much of a happy ending, and this was more realistic. Finally, I loved the main character's development of a close relationship with her in-laws and how they really became a found family for her. That's one of my favorite things, and she finally chose a family that would help and support and look after her.
I need a glass of wine just to revisit what I finished reading a couple nights ago. Speaking of the night I finished it, I slept like crap that night. I was in that in and out of state of maybe I'm dreaming but maybe I'm not, maybe I'm sleeping but maybe I'm not. 100% due to this book.
This is the book I told all my friends about. Several want to pick it up. A couple know they wouldn't be able to handle it. They're probably right; it's pretty damn tough to read.
As a woman, as a mother, I was crying. A LOT.
I really loved this book. I loved Mireille. I loved Michael.
The worst thing about books like this are the nitpicky reviews that get too offended, too political, too whatever and reduce a book like this to one star as if it was written by an eight-year-old with no editor. Shame on you.
One I'll remember for a long time.
5 Stars
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