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A Novel
by Andrea Levy
Book Reviewed by:The author of Small Island tells the story of the last turbulent years of slavery and the early years of freedom in nineteenth-century Jamaica.
Small Island introduced Andrea Levy to America and was acclaimed as “a triumph” (San Francisco Chronicle). It won both the Orange Prize and the Whitbread Book of the Year Award, and has sold over a million copies worldwide. With The Long Song, Levy once again reinvents the historical novel.
Told in the irresistibly willful and intimate voice of Miss July, with some editorial assistance from her son, Thomas, The Long Song is at once defiant, funny, and shocking. The child of a field slave on the Amity sugar plantation, July lives with her mother until Mrs. Caroline Mortimer, a recently transplanted English widow, decides to move her into the great house and rename her “Marguerite.”
Resourceful and mischievous, July soon becomes indispensable to her mistress. Together they live through the bloody Baptist war, followed by the violent and chaotic end of slavery. Taught to read and write so that she can help her mistress run the business, July remains bound to the plantation despite her “freedom.” It is the arrival of a young English overseer, Robert Goodwin, that will dramatically change life in the great house for both July and her mistress. Prompted and provoked by her son’s persistent questioning, July’s resilience and heartbreak are gradually revealed in this extraordinarily powerful story of slavery, revolution, freedom, and love.
.... Best of all though is the story itself. As Miss July bears two children of her own, loses them, and navigates the fine lines of mulatto, quadroon and full negro blood, I became immersed in her life. This is the first book I have read in a while that balances misery and loss with a fairly happy ending. The Long Song is recommended as the best sort of historical fiction and a fine pick for reading groups. I can imagine lively discussions over rum punch and fried plantains...continued
Full Review
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(Reviewed by Judy Krueger).
What is Metafiction?
It depends on whom you ask, as the term is somewhat slippery, meaning that various authors and literary critics define it differently. William H. Gass coined the term in 1970 in an essay entitled "Philosophy and the Form of Fiction". Commenting on American fiction of the 1960s, Gass pointed out that a new term was needed for the emerging genre of experimental texts that openly broke with the tradition of literary realism still dominant in post-WW II American literature. Metafiction is thus an elastic concept covering a wide range of fictions.
John Barth (Lost in the Funhouse), Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid's Tale), Kurt Vonnegut (Breakfast of Champions), A. S. Byatt (Possession) and Salman Rushdie (...
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If you liked The Long Song, try these:
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Published 2017
A singular, blistering novel about a teenage girl who has lost everything - and will burn anything.
by Alice Hoffman
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