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aprilcote's review against another edition
2.0
I read this because it was on the Time magazine’s top 100 books of 2020. I won’t make the same mistake again. It was depressing, disjointed and trying way too hard to be a literary masterpiece. It took me forever to get through. Page turner it was not. If you want to feel confused and sad and angry while reading grab your copy today.
aleenabeth's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
_lilbey_'s review against another edition
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
I really liked it overall, but was left feeling off kilter by the two chapters in the middle that did not seem to fit the rest of the narrative- the first from the perspective of Justine's father-in-law and the second that focused on characters who were not found (save for a very brief mention) anywhere else in the story.
It's unclear why we needed Ferrell's perspective on anything, as the story prior focused on mother-daughter relationships.
And while the chapter with Mose, Marni, and Stevie was incredibly engaging, it did not fit the rest of the book. It felt more like a short story that one would find in the New Yorker or Esquire. Perhaps this bothers me more than it should because I really enjoyed this chapter and was hoping to learn more about these characters and how they linked to the MCs but no, the chapter ended very abruptly with no clear sense of closure and that was that. This chapter and my feeling of loss and confusion at not knowing why these characters were important or what happened to them is a major contributor to a 4 star rating vs. 5.
It's unclear why we needed Ferrell's perspective on anything, as the story prior focused on mother-daughter relationships.
And while the chapter with Mose, Marni, and Stevie was incredibly engaging, it did not fit the rest of the book. It felt more like a short story that one would find in the New Yorker or Esquire. Perhaps this bothers me more than it should because I really enjoyed this chapter and was hoping to learn more about these characters and how they linked to the MCs but no, the chapter ended very abruptly with no clear sense of closure and that was that. This chapter and my feeling of loss and confusion at not knowing why these characters were important or what happened to them is a major contributor to a 4 star rating vs. 5.
micahnow17's review against another edition
4.0
This book captured the dry, hard desperation of the time and place very well. Each woman strong in her own way. I found it a good, immersive read.
bsmorris's review against another edition
4.0
At first, I was really confused by this novel, and my initial review reflected that. But I rewrote the review because I couldn’t stop thinking about the novel and 24 hours later I had kind of a revelation: the novel is about generational trauma. It follows, to varying degrees, four generations of Cherokee women: Granny, Lula, Justine, and Reney, as they struggle with the abusive relationships they endure. Often these are romantic relationships with men, but the women’s relationships with each other and especially with their Holiness church are also more or less abusive.
Granny’s white husband was abusive; Lula’s husband disappeared, and while she seeks comfort in the church, it also prevents her from getting treatment for epilepsy that could have greatly improved her quality of life; Lula is abusive at times to Justine; Justine and Reney both end up in abusive romantic relationships. The structure is also weird - not exactly chronological, and sometimes veering off into side plots narrated by minor characters. The changes in point of view can be confusing. The last part of the book becomes apocalyptic and starts to feel like science fiction. However, the characters are well-developed, sympathetic, and complex. I really enjoyed the novel and its emotionally evocative style, even as I struggled to understand it.
I read reviews by other readers complaining that despite the characters being Cherokee, there wasn’t “enough culture” for their tastes. My initial reaction was to dismiss those concerns - after all, if the author is Cherokee writing about Cherokee characters, who am I as a white reader to question her depiction of Cherokee culture? And after all, this is only one story, so it doesn’t necessarily speak for all Native Americans or even all Cherokee people.
But I kept thinking about a quote from close to the end of the novel. Here’s where I might get into some spoilers. Justine is thinking about her mother and grandmother: “Granny had been brought up in Indian orphanages and, later, Indian boarding schools. She’d never taught her grandchildren the language beyond basic greetings. She simply said that life was harder for those who spoke it” (p. 182). (Lula, too, attended an Indian boarding school, mentioned on p. 4.) Justine reflects on her lifelong intentions to learn the language that never came to fruition. She thinks about how her daughter has finally broken the cycle of abuse by completely leaving the area.
I thought about the side plot that shows Justine’s white father-in-law Ferrell’s point of view, in which he neglects his wife to death and never calls Justine by her name - she is always “the Indian.” The side plot about the lesbian couple assaulted by meth addicts, and the later mention of Jett, the high school football player that Reney makes out with once, who “turned into a meth head.”
And I finally realized that this novel is about generational trauma. It’s fundamentally based on the trauma inflicted by a white society that tried to erase Native American culture through orphanages and boarding schools and how that abuse started the cycle of abuse that many Native Americans are unable to free themselves from today. In my eyes, the fundamentalist church that many characters in this novel turn to for comfort merely perpetuates the abuse by oppressing women and forcing all its members into a narrow-minded set of rules that even prevents them from accessing basic health care. Both white and Native American men in the novel continue to abuse and denigrate Native American women. If there aren’t “enough” stereotypical markers of Native American culture here for some readers, it’s because the white supremacy that permeates our culture has robbed generations of Native Americans of their own language and traditions. This is the reality of life for some Native Americans in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. I could write so much more about other themes in the novel, but this seems like the most important one to highlight in my review.
Many thanks to Grove Atlantic for the free book. I’m so happy to have been introduced to Kelli Jo Ford and I can’t wait to see what she writes next.
Granny’s white husband was abusive; Lula’s husband disappeared, and while she seeks comfort in the church, it also prevents her from getting treatment for epilepsy that could have greatly improved her quality of life; Lula is abusive at times to Justine; Justine and Reney both end up in abusive romantic relationships. The structure is also weird - not exactly chronological, and sometimes veering off into side plots narrated by minor characters. The changes in point of view can be confusing. The last part of the book becomes apocalyptic and starts to feel like science fiction. However, the characters are well-developed, sympathetic, and complex. I really enjoyed the novel and its emotionally evocative style, even as I struggled to understand it.
I read reviews by other readers complaining that despite the characters being Cherokee, there wasn’t “enough culture” for their tastes. My initial reaction was to dismiss those concerns - after all, if the author is Cherokee writing about Cherokee characters, who am I as a white reader to question her depiction of Cherokee culture? And after all, this is only one story, so it doesn’t necessarily speak for all Native Americans or even all Cherokee people.
But I kept thinking about a quote from close to the end of the novel. Here’s where I might get into some spoilers. Justine is thinking about her mother and grandmother: “Granny had been brought up in Indian orphanages and, later, Indian boarding schools. She’d never taught her grandchildren the language beyond basic greetings. She simply said that life was harder for those who spoke it” (p. 182). (Lula, too, attended an Indian boarding school, mentioned on p. 4.) Justine reflects on her lifelong intentions to learn the language that never came to fruition. She thinks about how her daughter has finally broken the cycle of abuse by completely leaving the area.
I thought about the side plot that shows Justine’s white father-in-law Ferrell’s point of view, in which he neglects his wife to death and never calls Justine by her name - she is always “the Indian.” The side plot about the lesbian couple assaulted by meth addicts, and the later mention of Jett, the high school football player that Reney makes out with once, who “turned into a meth head.”
And I finally realized that this novel is about generational trauma. It’s fundamentally based on the trauma inflicted by a white society that tried to erase Native American culture through orphanages and boarding schools and how that abuse started the cycle of abuse that many Native Americans are unable to free themselves from today. In my eyes, the fundamentalist church that many characters in this novel turn to for comfort merely perpetuates the abuse by oppressing women and forcing all its members into a narrow-minded set of rules that even prevents them from accessing basic health care. Both white and Native American men in the novel continue to abuse and denigrate Native American women. If there aren’t “enough” stereotypical markers of Native American culture here for some readers, it’s because the white supremacy that permeates our culture has robbed generations of Native Americans of their own language and traditions. This is the reality of life for some Native Americans in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. I could write so much more about other themes in the novel, but this seems like the most important one to highlight in my review.
Many thanks to Grove Atlantic for the free book. I’m so happy to have been introduced to Kelli Jo Ford and I can’t wait to see what she writes next.
knbee's review against another edition
5.0
Felt like this one was meant for me. Strong emphasis on people and place and the ties that bind. Loved the writing as well, straight forward with poetic tendencies. There is an unexpected turn at the end that I found really dark and haunting and... brilliant... because of its unexpectedness and seeming authenticity- a warning in case a lighter read would better serve right now. Great debut.
jntidmore's review against another edition
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
1.0
I kept reading in the hopes that something would happen. It never did.
blogginboutbooks's review against another edition
2.0
Ironically enough, I just told someone last night that I don't give two-star ratings on GR because if I'm really not enjoying a book, I DNF it. So, why did I keep reading CROOKED HALLELUJAH? Other than needing to read a book set in Oklahoma for a reading challenge, I really have no idea. If it hadn't been for the challenge, I would definitely not have finished it. Even with the challenge, I contemplated putting it down more than once.
I was intrigued by the premise of this book as well as several of its themes (racial/cultural identity, extreme religion, mother/daughter relationships, etc.). The story starts out alright, with a teenaged Justine talking about her grim life of poverty, her dysfunctional family, and the repression she experiences because of her membership in a strict fundamentalist church. When she becomes pregnant after being raped by an older "boy," it changes everything. After that introduction, the story bops around both in perspective and time. It becomes increasingly difficult to keep track of who's who and when's when, making the tale feel discombobulated and confusing. The novel has no actual plot, which certainly doesn't help things. It meanders here, there, and everywhere, even introducing perspectives that have no bearing at all on the story. Speaking of perspective, I was hoping CROOKED HALLELUJAH would give a unique one on the Native American experience. It doesn't. Instead, it reinforces all those "Indian" stereotypes: poverty, alcoholism, violence, unreliable men, broken women, etc. Add to all this the fact that the book is unrelentingly grim and depressing and, honestly, I'm not sure why I kept reading it! CROOKED HALLELUJAH was, unfortunately, an almost wholly dissatisfying and disappointing read for me.
On the bright side, Ford does know how to create a mood. Her settings are vivid in their bleakness and her characters are...not boring. The book does have themes that are worthy of discussion. It could also very well be that I'm missing the whole point of the novel. I do prefer straightforward stories that don't bury their points in abstraction.
I was intrigued by the premise of this book as well as several of its themes (racial/cultural identity, extreme religion, mother/daughter relationships, etc.). The story starts out alright, with a teenaged Justine talking about her grim life of poverty, her dysfunctional family, and the repression she experiences because of her membership in a strict fundamentalist church. When she becomes pregnant after being raped by an older "boy," it changes everything. After that introduction, the story bops around both in perspective and time. It becomes increasingly difficult to keep track of who's who and when's when, making the tale feel discombobulated and confusing. The novel has no actual plot, which certainly doesn't help things. It meanders here, there, and everywhere, even introducing perspectives that have no bearing at all on the story. Speaking of perspective, I was hoping CROOKED HALLELUJAH would give a unique one on the Native American experience. It doesn't. Instead, it reinforces all those "Indian" stereotypes: poverty, alcoholism, violence, unreliable men, broken women, etc. Add to all this the fact that the book is unrelentingly grim and depressing and, honestly, I'm not sure why I kept reading it! CROOKED HALLELUJAH was, unfortunately, an almost wholly dissatisfying and disappointing read for me.
On the bright side, Ford does know how to create a mood. Her settings are vivid in their bleakness and her characters are...not boring. The book does have themes that are worthy of discussion. It could also very well be that I'm missing the whole point of the novel. I do prefer straightforward stories that don't bury their points in abstraction.
em_harring's review against another edition
4.0
3.5 rounded up.
Overall, I liked this. I particularly loved the mother/daughter dynamics, and how each relationship affected the next. Crooked Hallelujah is a great look into intergenerational trauma and how we find ourselves stuck in cycles of being––especially those of us affected by setter colonialism, violence, and genocide.
Where I felt this novel needed more work was in the pacing and overall structure. The last half feels almost like interconnected short stories rather than part of a whole narrative. I didn't care for the POVs outside of the women (primarily Justine and Reney); I'm unsure what they really added to the story or why they were there. I think the narrative would have benefited from cutting those and spending more time in each time period with the women. The book jumps in time without giving the reader a sense of how much time has passed––which is fine; I just prefer my family narratives to be more drawn out and to give us more moments on the page with each family member. Instead, we get snippets from when Justine was young, then fast forwarding to when she's a young mother and Reney is around 8, then fast forwarding to when Reney is like 20 and acting just like Justine––there wasn't space to allow the characters to breathe on their own.
I'll definitely read more by Ford. I think she's a strong writer and I, for the most part, enjoyed the characters we followed.
I do want to add: I find it odd how some reviewers are saying that the novel isn't Native enough. This book is all about the trauma of colonialism (the great grandmother was a survivor of boarding schools and what happened to her there greatly affected the family...obviously). It is very much a novel set in Indian Country about what has happened to our communities because of colonialism. I don't really know what people were expecting? There is no one way to be Native--not all of us grow up on our ancestral lands or with our communities. TLDR: This is very much a Native book and if you don't see the various ways that it is indeed Native, that means that you have to do some reading and research on your own time. Not every book about Natives is going to completely rehash our trauma so you understand why things have happened the way they have. Also, maybe keep in mind that it's not for you, because you're not the audience (e.g., Native).
Overall, I liked this. I particularly loved the mother/daughter dynamics, and how each relationship affected the next. Crooked Hallelujah is a great look into intergenerational trauma and how we find ourselves stuck in cycles of being––especially those of us affected by setter colonialism, violence, and genocide.
Where I felt this novel needed more work was in the pacing and overall structure. The last half feels almost like interconnected short stories rather than part of a whole narrative. I didn't care for the POVs outside of the women (primarily Justine and Reney); I'm unsure what they really added to the story or why they were there. I think the narrative would have benefited from cutting those and spending more time in each time period with the women. The book jumps in time without giving the reader a sense of how much time has passed––which is fine; I just prefer my family narratives to be more drawn out and to give us more moments on the page with each family member. Instead, we get snippets from when Justine was young, then fast forwarding to when she's a young mother and Reney is around 8, then fast forwarding to when Reney is like 20 and acting just like Justine––there wasn't space to allow the characters to breathe on their own.
I'll definitely read more by Ford. I think she's a strong writer and I, for the most part, enjoyed the characters we followed.
I do want to add: I find it odd how some reviewers are saying that the novel isn't Native enough. This book is all about the trauma of colonialism (the great grandmother was a survivor of boarding schools and what happened to her there greatly affected the family...obviously). It is very much a novel set in Indian Country about what has happened to our communities because of colonialism. I don't really know what people were expecting? There is no one way to be Native--not all of us grow up on our ancestral lands or with our communities. TLDR: This is very much a Native book and if you don't see the various ways that it is indeed Native, that means that you have to do some reading and research on your own time. Not every book about Natives is going to completely rehash our trauma so you understand why things have happened the way they have. Also, maybe keep in mind that it's not for you, because you're not the audience (e.g., Native).