An American Marriage (2019)
Who wrote it?
Tayari Jones (1970- ; active 2002- ), born Atlanta, Georgia, USA. Her parents Mack and Barbara Jones were active participants in the civil rights movement in the Sixties who went on to become professors at Clark College in Washington State. She attended Spelman College, a historically Black women's college in Atlanta, during which time she studied unde the playwright Pearl Cleage, and subsequently gained a Master's in English from the University of Iowa and an MFA from Arizona State.
Her first novel, Leaving Atlanta (2002) details the events of the 1979-81 Atlanta child murders, a hugely significant event in Jones' own life (two of her elementary school classmates were murdered). It won Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for debut fiction. He subsequent novels, The Untelling (2005) and Silver Sparrow (2011) were similarly highly acclaimed. An American Marriage (published 2018) was strongly supported by Oprah Winfrey who featured it as part of her book club, and also featured in Barack Obama's Summer 2018 reading list. She has also edited an anthology of noir fiction, Atlanta Noir (2017).
What's it about?
An American Marriage is focused on the marriage of a middle-class Black American couple from Atlanta, Georgia. Roy, a sales representative who has worked his way up from a relatively poor background, and Celestial, an artist who makes dolls from a more wealthy family, are introduced as newlyweds. The novel begins with a fairly domestic focus, with the pair arguing over their respective relationships with their parents and suchlike. Their lives are turned upside down when Roy is arrested and imprisoned for raping a woman in a motel, a crime he plainly did not commit, after only 18 months of marriage.
Roy is handed a sentence of 12 years, and despite Celestial's lawyer uncle mounting determined and persistent appeals, there seems little hope of an early release. Initially the couple muddle through, with Celestial making uncomfortable but regular visits to Roy. As time elapses, events of significance happen to both. Roy's mother Olive dies in his absence, and he discovers his cellmate Walter is in fact his biological father (who he knew about but had never met). Celestial's career takes off and she begins to appear frustrated with her life being on hold and the demeaning nature of her prison visits. After around three years, Celestial sends Roy a letter ending their relationship but asking to remain friends, which Roy refuses. He does not respond to her letters for the following two years, but when he is eventually freed (to most parties' surprise) after five years, he holds out hope that Celestial will take him back since she hasn't actually divorced him.
During his imprisonment, Celestial has spent increasing time with her childhood best friend Andre (also a college colleague of Roy's who inadvertently introduced them). It becomes apparent to the reader that for the last few years Celestial and Andre have become more than friends. When Roy is released a few days early, he is unsure whether he still 'has a wife' and, after a reconciliation with his legal father, ends up having a brief but intense sexual relationship with a former schoolmate, Davina. Despite this, he feels a need to figure out where he stands with Celestial, and heads to Atlanta to confront her. He violenty beats up Andre, and after some soul-searching Celestial decides that her duty is to Roy. However, when she fails to be moved by his confession of his brief dalliance with Davina, he realises she has no real love left for him, and chooses not to stay with him, as acquiescing to her submission would be a form of rape.
What I liked
It’s another beautifully written entry in the canon. Hard to put down, it also has a real weightiness and sense of depth.
While the book focuses on universal issues - romance, infidelity, family - it’s particularly moving (and distressing) that in this particular case many of the major drivers of conflict between the central characters are out of their hands, and created only by the seemingly inevitable racism of the justice system. It’s a book that on a surface level is straightforward, familiar and accessible, but obviously packs a really significant punch beneath that surface in the deeper systemic issues it’s highlighting.
Those messages are hammered home by Jones’ choice of protagonists. While Roy is certainly not perfect, he is presented as successful, driven, hard-working, devoted and caring. He has done nothing at all to deserve his imprisonment. The message is simple and presented as unsurprising and inevitable (which it is to most of its protagonists) - his only crime was being Black in the wrong place at the wrong time. And by implication, what happened to Roy could happen to literally any other person in his situation (we later see numerous other Black characters adjusting their own behaviour in small and larger ways to avoid being targeted based on their race).
What I didn’t like
A few minor quibbles, but nothing too major. The ending to me felt a little hurried and with a few too many twists and turns without time to fully explore the consequences of those rapid shifts. While I was pleased with the outcome and its message, it did all feel a little too tidily wrapped up.
Alongside this, I felt there was a slightly contrived feeling to several of the other plot developments, notably the bizarre case of Roy ending up in prison with his estranged biological father. While some attempt was made to explain the coincidence, it did test credulity just a little.
I also thought that Andre, given his elevation by virtue of being one of the three characters in whose voice we hear the story told, was under-developed by contrast with Roy and Celestial.
Food & drink pairings
A devastating pear
Salmon croquettes
Fun facts
Jones has stated that the novel was originally written from Celestial’s perspective, and her early readers found her too unsympathetic, which led to her rewriting the whole book and including Roy and Andre’s perspectives in alternating chapters. This is quite interesting - I’d be super intrigued to get a sense of what the original version looked like as the novel is in many senses about Celestial’s agency and it would have been interesting to hear even more from her.
Jones has also mentioned that there is a deliberate echo of The Odyssey in her book, with Celestial taking on the Penelope role of the wife waiting for her husband over a long time period.
Soon after the book’s Women’s Prize victory, there was a lot of talk around Oprah having optioned the book for a film project. I can’t find any further updates past 2019 on this, but it would definitely be an intriguing prospect in the right hands.
Vanquished Foes
Pat Barker (The Silence of the Girls)
Oyinkan Braithwaite (My Sister, the Serial Killer)
Anna Burns (Milkman)
Diana Evans (Ordinary People)
Madeline Miller (Circe)
Milkman won the 2018 Booker Prize, some might say effectively ruling it out from taking this one. Braithwaite’s novel featured on the 2019 longlist. The 2019 Booker was controversially shared between Berdardine Evaristo’s Girl, Woman, Other (which shows up on the 2020 Women’s Prize shortlist) and Margaret Atwood’s The Testaments (which doesn’t).
Context
In 2019:
UK PM Theresa May resigns as Conservative leader; Boris Johnson elected her successor; later calls election and wins significantly increased majority
In early December, the first known human case of Covid-19 is identified in Wuhan, China - no reports will be released internationally until the end of the month
Record number of wildfires in the Amazon rainforest
4 million worldwide join climate strikes led by Greta Thunberg
Donald Trump becomes third US president to face impeachment, on two charges
US under Trump withdraw from 1987 Nuclear treaty; Russia follows suit
Christchurch, New Zealand mosque attacks
Series of bomb attacks across Sri Lanka leave over 250 dead
Start of Hong Kong protests regarding Chinese extradition legislation
Fire destroys roof and main spire of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris
Kivu Ebola outbreak kills 1000 in the second-deadliest outbreak in history
Presidential crisis in Venezuala
US justice department charges Chinese tech firm Huawei wih multiple counts of fraud; subsequent China-US Trade War
Ursula von der Leyen elected as new EU President, replacing Jean-Claude Juncker
Proroguing of UK Parliament by Boris Johnson's Conservatives over Brexit impasse - later ruled as unlawful
In October, a further million people march through London in People's Vote campaign for a second Brexit referendum
Emperor Akahito of Japan abdicates
Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir deposed in a coup after nearly 30 years in power
Boeing 737 fleet withdrawal after disastrous crashes
Taiwan's parliament becomes the first in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage
Ban on tourists climbing Uluru in Australia comes into effect
First ever image of a black hole produced by Event Horizon Telescope project
All-English Champions League final sees Liverpool defeat Spurs to win their sixth title
Candice Carty-Williams, Queenie
Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys
John Lanchester, The Wall
Parasite
Avengers: Endgame
Joker
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Billie Eilish, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?
Harry Styles, Fine Line
Little Simz, Grey Area
Tyler, the Creator, Igor
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Ghosteen
Life Lessons
There’s no justice
Score
8.5
Another one of those books that just screams quality. It’s a quiet, almost understated sort of thing, albeit one with a powerful message.
From the 2019 Booker winners, I gave Girl, Woman, Other a 9 and The Testaments an 8.
Ranking to date:
How to be both (2015) - Ali Smith - 9.5
Property (2003) - Valerie Martin - 9.5
A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing (2014) - Eimear McBride - 9.5
The Idea of Perfection (2001) - Kate Grenville - 9
Half of a Yellow Sun (2007) - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - 9
Home Fire (2018) - Kamila Shamsie - 9
The Lacuna (2010) - Barbara Kingsolver - 9
When I Lived in Modern Times (2000) - Linda Grant - 9
An American Marriage (2019) - Tayari Jones - 8.5
Larry’s Party (1998) - Carol Shields - 8.5
Bel Canto (2002) - Ann Patchett - 8.5
Small Island (2004) - Andrea Levy - 8.5
A Crime in the Neighbourhood (1999) - Suzanne Berne - 8.5
May We Be Forgiven (2013) - A. M. Homes - 8
The Tiger’s Wife (2011) - Téa Obreht - 8
On Beauty (2006) - Zadie Smith - 8
A Spell of Winter (1996) - Helen Dunmore - 8
The Road Home (2008) - Rose Tremain - 7.5
The Glorious Heresies (2016) - Lisa McInerney - 7.5
We Need to Talk About Kevin (2005) - Lionel Shriver - 7.5
The Song of Achilles (2012) - Madeline Miller - 7
Home (2009) - Marilynne Robinson - 7
Fugitive Pieces (1997) - Anne Michaels - 6.5
The Power (2017) - Naomi Alderman - 5
Next up
A few selections from the 2023 Booker Prize longlist, which is a really intriguing and somewhat surprising (in omissions rather than inclusions) selection… before coming back to the Women’s Prize with 2020’s winner Hamnet.
