Song of Solomon: A Novel
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • An official Oprah Winfrey’s “The Books That Help Me Through” selection • The acclaimed Nobel Prize winner transfigures the coming-of-age story with this brilliantly imagined novel. Includes a new foreword by the author.
One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years
Milkman Dead was born shortly after a neighborhood eccentric hurled himself off a rooftop in a vain attempt at flight. For the rest of his life he, too, will be trying to fly. As Morrison follows Milkman from his rustbelt city to the place of his family’s origins, she introduces an entire cast of strivers and seeresses, liars and assassins, the inhabitants of a fully realized Black world.
“Morrison moves easily in and out of the lives and thoughts of her characters, luxuriating in the diversity of circumstances and personality, and revelling in the sound of their voices and of her own, which echoes and elaborates theirs.” —The New Yorker
One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years
Milkman Dead was born shortly after a neighborhood eccentric hurled himself off a rooftop in a vain attempt at flight. For the rest of his life he, too, will be trying to fly. As Morrison follows Milkman from his rustbelt city to the place of his family’s origins, she introduces an entire cast of strivers and seeresses, liars and assassins, the inhabitants of a fully realized Black world.
“Morrison moves easily in and out of the lives and thoughts of her characters, luxuriating in the diversity of circumstances and personality, and revelling in the sound of their voices and of her own, which echoes and elaborates theirs.” —The New Yorker
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Community Reviews
The book starts out strong; really capturing your attention. There were some laugh-out-loud moments as well. I became invested in the story and in the characters, as their individual subplots were tying in together nicely.
[Cons:] However, the ending seemed rushed, as if her editor was saying, "I need those pages now!" The more interesting subplots are not explored or explained at all, while others that I felt could have been left out completed were dragged out. The ending goes completely left. It doesn't even read as if the same person wrote it. I would not recommend this book only because the last 1/4 of it is not cohesive. It's like reading the beginning of one book and the ending of a completely different book. Also, not one of my favorite authors, so you may want to take that into consideration as well.
Morrison always has a way of making her characters feel incredibly tangible and flushed out. With this story in particular she had an incredible way of connecting all of her characters together so that what seemed like random events and comments all came together and fit together like a puzzle. I loved figuring out how everything was connected to the first chapter where readers are introduced to the town in a kind of abstract way. Getting to see these characters from different angles helped with making them dimensional instead of static and I enjoyed reading as Milkman learned more about his life and the world. As always, Morrison touches on topics that readers are afraid to approach but that is why reading these stories is important. Although the book was a little dense which made it hard to follow at times, Morrison will always be a great read.
I loved the beginning of this book so much. The beginning is a 5; I thought I'd found a new favorite. But the book gets increasingly more stressful and the characters grow more hateful and the second half I was just eager for the book to end.
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