Transcendent Kingdom, Yaa Gyasi, Alfred A Knopf, 2020, 265 pp
I loved this book from the first page to the last. I think Yaa Gyasi has a large, expansive mind. She likes to span the spaces between places, the fault lines between people, and the vast contradictions inside individuals. If you read her first novel, Homegoing, you know this.
Gifty is the daughter of Ghanian immigrants to the United States. As a child she lived as one of the few Black children in a small Southern town. Her mother is a devout Pentecostal but her father, never having felt at home in America, left and returned to Ghana. She adores her older brother Nana, but he succumbed to an overdose after becoming addicted to Oxycontin, prescribed by a doctor for a sports injury.
Her mother has twice succumbed to depression. Gifty turns to neuroscience to discover the scientific basis for addiction and depression. As a PhD candidate at Stanford her only friends are her lab mice and her lab partner.
Though she turned away from religion it is embedded deep in her consciousness. Wading through the distances between science and religion, between aloneness and connection, Gifty is a heroine unlike many others I have come across.
Transcendent Kingdom was a perfect read for the times. As an ideological war rages between those who look to science for answers to COVID and those who refuse to face facts, it made me look more deeply into the intersections of faith, science and love.
stimulating subjects... i used to ride bikes around the Stanford campus a lot does she happen to mention Lake Lagunita? i got bit by a lizard there, once... when i was trying to catch it, of course!
ReplyDeleteNot that I recall. She spends most of her time in her lab. Did you catch that lizard? How big was it? Our property is crawling with lizards in the summer.
Deleteor the Frost amphitheatre?
ReplyDeleteI once played a gig in Stanford at the Barnes and Noble store. It was just great to be in the town of such a great university and home of some of my favorite writers.
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DeleteI'm gonna throw this in with my Buddyread!
ReplyDeleteHonestly, this just shows that she's the kinda person that when they set their mind to something, there is no stopping them! A PhD candidate... impressive!
ReplyDeleteGood point!
DeleteI have not read Yaa Gyasi's latest novel yet, but have read it sounds great! I still have Homegoing in my to be read pile, so I will get around to reading it first.
ReplyDeleteReading Homegoing first is a good idea!
DeleteI recently watched some of the sessions of the virtual Texas Book Festival, one of which featured a conversation with Yaa Gyasi about her book. Just fascinating. I only wished I had heard the conversation before I read the wonderful book.
ReplyDeleteOoh. I will have to find that conversation!
DeleteI love your first paragraph - that perfectly describes what I took away from Homegoing. I haven't gotten around to this one yet, but soon, soon.
ReplyDeleteYes, she keeps it up in this one though it is a more modern story.
DeleteWhich one did you like better Homegoing or this more modern one? Just curious.
ReplyDeleteI would say I liked them equally but for different reasons.
DeleteI’ve seen this book a lot, it certainly seems to get well deserved praised. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteYou are welcome!
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