bgg616's review against another edition
5.0
There has been a lot of discussion about the merits (or lack of) of this book. The author won me over because she asks not the simple question of what freedom means to formerly enslaved people, but what has the world lost in terms of creativity, inventions, genius and more in keeping large numbers of people from reaching their potential.
I was immediately pulled into this novel. The story captivated me. With one exception,while not all of the "science" makes sense, that didn't detract from the story for me. The exception was the disappearance of a key character in the Canadian Arctic. Washington Black is smart, and driven. Like other enslaved Africans of the time, he does not know who his mother is (or father) nor where he was born. He is fortunate at a young age to be taken out of the fields, and taken on by Christopher Wilde, a son of the plantation owner, as an assistant. As a description of the book states, sometimes it reads like a fairy tale. But I was open to this, and Wash's adventures. The story was well constructed, and beautifully written. While some readers felt it wasn't "literary" enough, I went back to an article by Jane Friedman "What is a literary novel?" https://www.janefriedman.com/what-is-a-literary-novel/
which details that a novel must : be Intellectual e.g a novel about ideas; have Depth e.g. interwoven plots and subplots; about Character e.g. the people in the book drive the plot and aren't simply devices to forward the plot; and have Style e.g. gorgeous writing, beautiful prose. Washington Black is a novel that in my view satisfies all of these.
I was immediately pulled into this novel. The story captivated me. With one exception,while not all of the "science" makes sense, that didn't detract from the story for me. The exception was the disappearance of a key character in the Canadian Arctic. Washington Black is smart, and driven. Like other enslaved Africans of the time, he does not know who his mother is (or father) nor where he was born. He is fortunate at a young age to be taken out of the fields, and taken on by Christopher Wilde, a son of the plantation owner, as an assistant. As a description of the book states, sometimes it reads like a fairy tale. But I was open to this, and Wash's adventures. The story was well constructed, and beautifully written. While some readers felt it wasn't "literary" enough, I went back to an article by Jane Friedman "What is a literary novel?" https://www.janefriedman.com/what-is-a-literary-novel/
which details that a novel must : be Intellectual e.g a novel about ideas; have Depth e.g. interwoven plots and subplots; about Character e.g. the people in the book drive the plot and aren't simply devices to forward the plot; and have Style e.g. gorgeous writing, beautiful prose. Washington Black is a novel that in my view satisfies all of these.
jaclyn_sixminutesforme's review against another edition
4.0
4.5⭐️
This is largely an adventure story following Wash, born into slavery on a plantation in Barbados. Wash is tasked to assist an inventor with his maiden flight of his ‘cloud-cutter,’ and from here we follow as his own adventure literally takes flight.
This is a well paced narrative with a compelling cast of characters, and raises important discussions about the global reach of slavery.
I’d highly recommend this if you enjoyed Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad - similar vibe and writing style to this one, and both excellent reads!
This is largely an adventure story following Wash, born into slavery on a plantation in Barbados. Wash is tasked to assist an inventor with his maiden flight of his ‘cloud-cutter,’ and from here we follow as his own adventure literally takes flight.
This is a well paced narrative with a compelling cast of characters, and raises important discussions about the global reach of slavery.
I’d highly recommend this if you enjoyed Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad - similar vibe and writing style to this one, and both excellent reads!
mcomer's review against another edition
5.0
A really stunning and horrifying book by turns - Esi Edugyan brilliantly portrays how beauty and horror intermix across several landscapes of brutality. It's hard to convey both the wonders of the natural world and the thrill of exploring it while also showing the pain humans inflict on each other without sounding preachy, but this book balances all of these beautifully. I wouldn't normally have read this - the blurb sounds very much like an adventure story, which isn't my favorite genre - but I received it in my Books that Matter subscription box, and it definitely counts as a 'book that matters'. Highly recommend.
blulady's review against another edition
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
jasonfurman's review against another edition
4.0
A historical novel set in the 1830s that gives the account of George Washington Black, born a slave in Barbados who escapes on a hot air balloon with the naturalist brother of his master, named Titch, and ends up traveling to the arctic, Canada, and beyond. It is told in the first person and covers Wash’s (as he is known) life from age 11 through 18, which just happens to straddle his own freedom as well as the ending of slavery in the British Empire. In the course of these short years Wash goes from a superstitious field hand on a plantation to a confident young man, a naturalist in his own right, who can navigate the world on his own.
Washington Black has all the authenticity of the best historical novels, covering a wide canvass from the brutality of plantations in Barbados to the lawlessness of frontier towns in Canada to London with Newgate prison looming in the background. Wash himself is a great character and watching him mature and grow is a pleasure. The people around him are interesting as well and you learn a lot about them by how they think about Wash and relate to the tremdous racism that is directed at him. The plot is also interesting enough with some perils along the way, albeit with too many deus ex machina coincidences to be fully satisfying.
Overall I quite liked the book, the characters will stay with me for some time, but it lacked that special quality that makes you want to stop random strangers and tell them they must read this book (a feeling one had with Underground Railroad, for example). Partly that may have been that a number of the elements were familiar enough already or the plot was a bit too straightforward or the progress a little too linear. None of that bad and am glad I read it, just not fully living up to all the top books of 2018 lists that this showed up on.
Washington Black has all the authenticity of the best historical novels, covering a wide canvass from the brutality of plantations in Barbados to the lawlessness of frontier towns in Canada to London with Newgate prison looming in the background. Wash himself is a great character and watching him mature and grow is a pleasure. The people around him are interesting as well and you learn a lot about them by how they think about Wash and relate to the tremdous racism that is directed at him. The plot is also interesting enough with some perils along the way, albeit with too many deus ex machina coincidences to be fully satisfying.
Overall I quite liked the book, the characters will stay with me for some time, but it lacked that special quality that makes you want to stop random strangers and tell them they must read this book (a feeling one had with Underground Railroad, for example). Partly that may have been that a number of the elements were familiar enough already or the plot was a bit too straightforward or the progress a little too linear. None of that bad and am glad I read it, just not fully living up to all the top books of 2018 lists that this showed up on.
lewismillholland's review against another edition
1.0
It was a little scary to run the Secret Santa program because its first true test, by definition, had to be on production. I took the names and emails of all four of us — Chloe, Claudia, Jason and me — and the program scrambled who was assigned to whom (without creating two mutually exclusive pairs) and sent an email to each Secret Santa with their assignee. Thankfully, it worked.
Jason got me. He got me "Washington Black" by Esi Edugyan and in usual fashion all he said was "it's good shit." The accolades page was interesting because amid the awards and shortlists and such it had, in the biggest font, "One of Barack Obama's favorite books of the year." Haven't seen that before. At least, I haven't seen and registered that before.
The plot was a little too adventure-y for me and while the 2019-esque wokeness to the white savior's focus on slavery as a moral stain rather than on the slaves as individuals it was a bit too explicit and unresolved for me.
That being said, the ending was strong. I mean the very ending, the last line, with Washington stepping out into the blurry Moroccan sunrise with Tanna calling his name behind him. It was satisfying. It deepened the relationship between Washington and Titch because of how much Washington's last moment in the book echoed Titch's voluntary disappearance into the Arctic snow. Very father-like-son without stating it explicitly, and much as Titch abandoned Washington (and possibly only used him as a proxy for a greater evil), Washington abandons Tanna in these final moments.
Much of the book, however, lacked this subtlety, which is my perennial complaint (read: personal preference). Throughout the novel all the characters' emotions are listed explicitly and, if there's any dissonance, you're instantly told what it's between and why it is. Little is left to the subtext.
My second complaint is one I carried since I started the book. It's that Erasmus is archetypically evil and Titch is archetypically good. Erasmus gets no intriguing spot of redemption although admittedly Titch gets some blots on his perfect record at the end of the book, namely his childhood cruelty to Philip and his confusion between the immorality of slavery as a system versus the suffering of slaves as individuals. There's also his abandonment of Washington in the Arctic, but if I'm being honest I still don't understand why he did that or what happened because of it other than a bridge to the next act.
Even if I didn't love it this was a fun ride and I'd recommend it to someone going on a beach trip or who isn't 2019 woke on race.
Jason got me. He got me "Washington Black" by Esi Edugyan and in usual fashion all he said was "it's good shit." The accolades page was interesting because amid the awards and shortlists and such it had, in the biggest font, "One of Barack Obama's favorite books of the year." Haven't seen that before. At least, I haven't seen and registered that before.
The plot was a little too adventure-y for me and while the 2019-esque wokeness to the white savior's focus on slavery as a moral stain rather than on the slaves as individuals it was a bit too explicit and unresolved for me.
That being said, the ending was strong. I mean the very ending, the last line, with Washington stepping out into the blurry Moroccan sunrise with Tanna calling his name behind him. It was satisfying. It deepened the relationship between Washington and Titch because of how much Washington's last moment in the book echoed Titch's voluntary disappearance into the Arctic snow. Very father-like-son without stating it explicitly, and much as Titch abandoned Washington (and possibly only used him as a proxy for a greater evil), Washington abandons Tanna in these final moments.
Much of the book, however, lacked this subtlety, which is my perennial complaint (read: personal preference). Throughout the novel all the characters' emotions are listed explicitly and, if there's any dissonance, you're instantly told what it's between and why it is. Little is left to the subtext.
My second complaint is one I carried since I started the book. It's that Erasmus is archetypically evil and Titch is archetypically good. Erasmus gets no intriguing spot of redemption although admittedly Titch gets some blots on his perfect record at the end of the book, namely his childhood cruelty to Philip and his confusion between the immorality of slavery as a system versus the suffering of slaves as individuals. There's also his abandonment of Washington in the Arctic, but if I'm being honest I still don't understand why he did that or what happened because of it other than a bridge to the next act.
Even if I didn't love it this was a fun ride and I'd recommend it to someone going on a beach trip or who isn't 2019 woke on race.
togdon's review against another edition
4.0
Very well written. My only complaints were that some of the coincidences and ties between characters were too tidy and that the end was both a bit abrupt and not entirely satisfying.
bookworm_ohsea's review against another edition
- Strong character development? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.5
vanbastarache's review against another edition
2.0
What a horrible book. Always running around the point and never any real answers for the protagonist or the reader.