Guess that’s where the tears came from, knowing that there’s so much in this great big world that you don’t have a single ounce of control over. Guess the sooner you learn that, the sooner you’ll have one less heartbreak in your life. Oh Lord. Some evenings I don’t know where the old pains end and the new ones begin. Feels like the older you get the more they run into one long, deep aching.
pages: 196
read: 6/17-18/2020
book: 48 in 2020
As the book opens in 2001, it is the evening of sixteen-year-old Melody's coming of age ceremony in her grandparents' Brooklyn brownstone. Watched lovingly by her relatives and friends, making her entrance to the music of Prince, she wears a special custom-made dress. But the event is not without poignancy. Sixteen years earlier, that very dress was measured and sewn for a different wearer: Melody's mother, for her own ceremony-- a celebration that ultimately never took place.
Unfurling the history of Melody's parents and grandparents to show how they all arrived at this moment, Woodson considers not just their ambitions and successes but also the costs, the tolls they've paid for striving to overcome expectations and escape the pull of history. As it explores sexual desire and identity, ambition, gentrification, education, class and status, and the life-altering facts of parenthood, Red at the Bone most strikingly looks at the ways in which young people must so often make long-lasting decisions about their lives--even before they have begun to figure out who they are and what they want to be.
Unfurling the history of Melody's parents and grandparents to show how they all arrived at this moment, Woodson considers not just their ambitions and successes but also the costs, the tolls they've paid for striving to overcome expectations and escape the pull of history. As it explores sexual desire and identity, ambition, gentrification, education, class and status, and the life-altering facts of parenthood, Red at the Bone most strikingly looks at the ways in which young people must so often make long-lasting decisions about their lives--even before they have begun to figure out who they are and what they want to be.
THOUGHTS
wow wow wooooowowowowowoow.
oof.
i had wanted to read this one since maybe last year...not sure why i put it off but i requested it at my library and dove in once it got approved.
i didn't read the synopsis (other than the first time last year...and i'd already forgotten), i didn't read any reviews on this (a lot are good but i didn't even delve into those because i wanted to have a clear mind going into this one) and most importantly! i did not look for spoilers (ya know that's major on my end!) so i wasnt really sure what to expect.
i really truly liked this read.
i feel like no matter what i say, i will not do it the justice it deserves.
i will say this: while i did not see any of it coming, i did see that ONE thing though...the thing that happens on page 181 (i think that's the page on the kindle app anyway) i don't know how, i just did. i was surprised to be right.
but anyway, what i love about this book: for lack of better phrasing, this book is one big juxtaposition.
there are issues that happen to one person that the other doesn't care about that later on comes back to face the person who did not care in the first round.
idk, idk how to describe it and i dont want to say much because i dont want to spoil it here. i truly believe this is a book everyone should read.
the story goes back and forth between Aubrey & Iris and her parents. there are chapters in there that include Melody as well as Aubrey's mom.
the contrast between Iris and Aubrey was so well done.
the things that they went through, the things that deep down inside he knew but knew better not to ask....the things that Iris learned later on....ahh!!! its so freaking much!
and that ending! that's some full circle shit. (again, i dont want to say because i dont want to spoil it!) SO GOOD!
there was so much that i highlighted, so many things and passages and quotes that i loved that i want to own a copy of this and re-read it soon. loved this read.
i know i wont be able to properly give this book the justice it deserves so ill end it here but i will say Jacqueline has this way with words and her story that you get sucked in. i cannot wait to read more of her stuff.
ill do quick spoilers so jump on over if ya wanna know.
thanks for reading!
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SPOILERS
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aubrey grew up poor while iris grew up, idk if i'd say with money but i'd say better off.
they end up getting pregnant when she is just 15. she took his virginity and he had a feeling he wasnt the first but he didn't ask.
he wasn't. she'd lost her virginity to some dude at 13 who she later saw all over some other girl after they slept together. so she adapted the idea that you can sleep with them but you cant ever feel for them. which in the end really did fuck her over because Aubrey did really love her. although she also did catch him feeling up on some other chick. so its just this circle.
anyway, they get pregnant. her mother beats her and curses her but they end up letting her stay and even take Aubrey to live with them. Iris is adamant that she will have this baby and no one can say otherwise.
Aubrey was content having his job in the mail room. he was happy. he never aimed to have more than what he needed and that irked Iris.
the baby arrives.
iris was insistent that the baby would be born but she never thought past what she would do once the baby arrived. and once she did she freaked out.
when she was pregnant, she got kicked out of private school but ended up attending public school. she was home schooled but in reality once everyone left, she'd just sit back and watch tv. Aubrey took her to his mom's and they formed a bond. they'd meet up at the library and his mother lit a fire in her ass. she decided essentially that baby be damned, she was going to get her education. so she was there for Melody's beginning but once college came around, Iris left as far as possible. leaving Aubrey at home with Melody at her parents house.
Iris insisted that the baby be born but she never thought of the after.
once she is in college she becomes distant (by this point, she wasn't mom to Melody just Iris) barely goes home, hardly calls...she's not a mother at all.
she ends up meeting this woman names Jamison (aka Jam) and to make it short, they end up hooking up. well, i should say, Iris ends up falling in love with her.
she of course didnt tell her Melody was her daughter but let her assume she was her sister. so one morning after hooking up, Iris awakes to Jam playing with her breasts (she'd always find ways to avoid that from happening). she is still producing milk. Jam pieces it together that Melody is her daughter and she walks away.
after breaking Aubrey's heart by rejecting him all the time, Jam is now doing the same to her. she blows her off. eventually when she re-emerges she runs into Jam with another woman.
her heart is broken.
as the story progresses, you see the back story between Sabe & Po' Boy (Iris' parents) and how they met and you learn that Aubrey actually passes away. during 9/11. so while Po' Boy was looking like he was going to be the first one to leave, its actually Aubrey. then Po' Boy and then finally Sabe. (Aubrey's mother passes away i think around the time Melody was a year old)
in the end, after Iris didnt want to be a mother and knowing very well that Melody would choose her father over her in half of a heartbeat, its just them two that are left together.
and that right there is some kind of beautiful because this book is just...ahhh!!!
there is a lot i left out and im pretty sure i butchered it here and there but trust me, if you read the spoilers, im still asking you to read this book. and you know i NEVER do that!
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