bkwrm1317's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
sad
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
4.0
Gyasi’s Transcendant Kingdom is a tale of family, heartbreak, grief, and finding answers in science to the illness of addiction.
Our protagonist (Gifty), a Ghanaian-American scientist doing post-doc work at Stanford looks back on her childhood in Alabama with her brother Nana and her mother. Her father (nicknamed the Chin Chin Man), leaves them to go back to Ghana when Gifty is young.
Gifty’s brother Nana is a sports star growing up, until he hurts his ankle playing HS basketball and goes from Huntsville, Alabama’s high school ball star town hero to an OxyContin addict when it’s prescribed to him during his recovery. His addiction leads to his eventual overdose and death, and pushes Gifty from an evangelical youth to a scientist studying the reward pathway in the brain to find answers she didn’t get from her brother, and that her mom was unable to give through her own grief and depression.
Hard but hopeful, this is a well written exploration of forgiving ourselves and our loved ones, the ravages of addiction and the opioid epidemic of the US, and the African immigrant experience, as well as reflections on what is bigger than/beyond us, and the comfort religion can provide in the wake of grief and loss.
Our protagonist (Gifty), a Ghanaian-American scientist doing post-doc work at Stanford looks back on her childhood in Alabama with her brother Nana and her mother. Her father (nicknamed the Chin Chin Man), leaves them to go back to Ghana when Gifty is young.
Gifty’s brother Nana is a sports star growing up, until he hurts his ankle playing HS basketball and goes from Huntsville, Alabama’s high school ball star town hero to an OxyContin addict when it’s prescribed to him during his recovery. His addiction leads to his eventual overdose and death, and pushes Gifty from an evangelical youth to a scientist studying the reward pathway in the brain to find answers she didn’t get from her brother, and that her mom was unable to give through her own grief and depression.
Hard but hopeful, this is a well written exploration of forgiving ourselves and our loved ones, the ravages of addiction and the opioid epidemic of the US, and the African immigrant experience, as well as reflections on what is bigger than/beyond us, and the comfort religion can provide in the wake of grief and loss.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Death, Mental illness, and Grief
jasmine_peacock's review against another edition
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Mental illness, Drug use, and Drug abuse
melm_'s review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Drug abuse
Minor: Mental illness and Grief
mxpringle's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
This book talked about really hard topics, but it was beautiful enough to where that was completely okay and warranted. It had such a unique reflection on both the value and harms of religion to a person's life that I found so inspiring. All of the hard topics that were brought up were like experiencing them the way real people experience them, not merely for a plot point, but intentionally crafting those as background to a person's character. This is the best book I have read in a long time. It was so stunningly beautiful that I'm honestly left a little bit unmoored after finishing it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Drug abuse, Abandonment, Death of parent, Mental illness, Terminal illness, Xenophobia, Emotional abuse, Grief, Drug use, Addiction, Suicide, Racism, and Alcohol
Moderate: Toxic relationship, Domestic abuse, Racism, and Sexual content
thisreadingcorner's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Transcendent Kingdom follows Gifty, a neuroscience PhD student doing research and reflecting on the ways in which immigration, addiction, abandonment, and grief have and continue to shape her view of the world. Although we see her in present day, the book toggles back and forth constantly to years past, scaffolding the honest reflections Gifty shares.
My favorite thing about this book is that there is no nobility in suffering. The humiliation of African immigrants (Ghanaian in this case) taking on poorly paid work with deeply racist Americans isn’t remade into sainthood. The family that gets left behind doesn’t take it on the chin. Addiction doesn’t magically get cured or inspire a lofty goal to save the world. A mother’s trauma doesn’t reduce the harm she leaves in her wake. None of them are perfect, all of them are real. So real in fact that I was taken aback by the kinship I felt to these fictional characters with lives so different from my own.
Gifty’s religious devolution is at the core of the book, the impact of grief on a young woman asking why? She sees glaring gaps in a doctrine sometimes merciful and sometimes vengeful, but even her work doesn’t offer her the clarity she seeks. That her faith is so tied to her relationship with her mother only complicates their dynamic when grief devastated the careful balancing act they both lived in. The stories around Gifty’s mother - her calls home, her patients, and her tumultuous mental health are gripping, in part because of the parallels to a common immigrant experience of starting over, but also because it held space for a mother’s humanity and a child’s pain.
I admired her commitment to her work and willingness to keep trying, even if only as a smoke screen. I empathized with her delayed awakenings in human connection, her constant daydreaming. I was relived to see the version of her we get in the end, fully actualized and moving forward, ambiguity still front and center.
I admired her commitment to her work and willingness to keep trying, even if only as a smoke screen. I empathized with her delayed awakenings in human connection, her constant daydreaming. I was relived to see the version of her we get in the end, fully actualized and moving forward, ambiguity still front and center.
I look forward to more stories like hers, maybe even more ambiguous. Gyasi is a master writer, the words jumped off the page for me, and I found myself grateful for a story so rooted in the grey.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Grief
Minor: Death of parent, Addiction, and Racial slurs
pandact's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
This book nailed my feelings with scientific precision, and Gyasi simultaneously leaves room for different kinds of faith. This reflective fine-tuning happened to be exactly what I was looking for, plus the slightly lonely and queer first-generation bildungsroman. I'd read a whole book where they dive into ethical and religious questions!
I hope it's also impactful for others who read it, and it shares similar themes with Freshwater, Liturgists, Semler, and the X-files.
Spoilers in tags
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Addiction, Drug use, Grief, Death, Drug abuse, Religious bigotry, Suicide attempt, and Racism
Moderate: Child death, Death of parent, Medical content, Sexual content, and Toxic friendship
Minor: Child abuse and Animal cruelty
Spoiler
Also I thought the ending made sense, almost like when a documentary flashes forward before the credits. The mother still wrapped up the emotional arc better than I expected from getting it spoiled in reviews!ksuazo94's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
sad
tense
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
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Drug use, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Drug abuse, and Self harm
Moderate: Death of parent, Racial slurs, and Racism
Minor: Infidelity
tangleroot_eli's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
A beautiful and painful book that demands the reader's full attention. Gyasi doesn't lay things out A then B then C; instead, she gives us a puzzle of C then A then Q and trusts that we as readers are clever enough and paying enough attention to put the pieces together.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Religious bigotry, Child death, Grief, Animal cruelty, Drug abuse, Addiction, Death, Ableism, Drug use, and Racism
Moderate: Blood, Racial slurs, Suicide attempt, Abandonment, Xenophobia, Bullying, Body shaming, Sexism, Violence, Child abuse, and Animal death
Minor: Medical content, Terminal illness, Forced institutionalization, Sexual content, Vomit, Pregnancy, Medical trauma, and Death of parent
kyana_'s review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Spoiler
charaktere:
Gifty hat mich so beeindruckt und hab sie so bewundert. vor allem für ihre persönliche Entwicklung, teilweise war ich schon bisschen stolz auf sie als sie am ende dann mit han zsm gekommen ist und überhaupt nicht mehr diese Bindungsängste hatte wie mit Raymond (den mochte ich eh nicht).
fand die Beschreibung der mutter auch so gut, diese Hassliebe (hass ist vlt bisschen zu stark) zwischen mutter und Tochter ist super erzählt und man kann es total gut nachempfinden.
was ich bei Gift vermisst hab an manchen stellen war die reflektion. sie hat immer alles reflektiert und man hatte als Leserin daran teilgenommen aber z.b. als sie im college was mit ihrer Freundin Anna oder Anne hatte, hat sie das irgendwie gar nicht gross reflektiert, das fand ich bisschen unrealistisch, weil sie ja schon sehr religiös aufgewachsen ist und es dann sinn machen würde immerhin ein bisschen innerlich mit sich zu ringen wenn man eine gleichgeschlechtliche Beziehung führt
story:
plot fand ich super gut, immer spannend, konnte es nicht weglegen und sind mir alle ans herz gewachsen.
was ich aber etwas schade fand, war, dass das ende ein bisschen zu plötzlich kam. ich hatte das Gefühl viele dinge waren nicht so ganz abgeschlossen und dann aufneinmal stirbt die mutter und Ahn und Gift leben zusammen. das ende für die mutter fand ich auch etwas schade, hätte mir ein anderes ende für sie gewünscht, oder genauere Beschreibung, ausführlicher...
look:
das format/ die ausgabe vom buch die ich hatte war leider +berhaupt nicht schön (war aber auch ausgeliehen). war viel zu gross und sperrig, Seiten waren zu dick, Schrift war schön und angenehm zu lesen aber hätte auch kleiner sein können von mir aus.
Content Warnings
Minor: Addiction, Racism, Mental illness, Grief, Drug use, Drug abuse, and Death
turtleduckiess's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, Grief, and Mental illness
Moderate: Drug use, Suicide attempt, and Racism