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Transcendent Kingdom

Yaa Gyasi

Start date: January 1, 2021

Finish date: January 31, 2021

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September-October 2025: The River Knows Your Name
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Jan 31, 2021 Brina rated it really liked it

Shelves: africa, african-american, fiction, science, addiction, religion

Last year I heard that Yaa Gyasi had finally written a new book. Needless to say I was thrilled because I so enjoyed her debut Homegoing. If it ever comes up, I will support the book over the Pulitzer winner that year Underground Railroad that was written about a similar topic. As with any of my preferred authors and their new books, I am dependent on the library and know going in that I will not be among one of the first to read it. One of my goodreads groups scheduled this book for January to Last year I heard that Yaa Gyasi had finally written a new book. Needless to say I was thrilled because I so enjoyed her debut Homegoing. If it ever comes up, I will support the book over the Pulitzer winner that year Underground Railroad that was written about a similar topic. As with any of my preferred authors and their new books, I am dependent on the library and know going in that I will not be among one of the first to read it. One of my goodreads groups scheduled this book for January to give everyone enough time to obtain the book. I had been admittedly busy and could not start with the group. Most people noted that the topic is heavy and if I am looking for something lighter to not read it at the moment; however, I had been anticipating this book for months and decided to read anyway. Albeit not the subject matter I was looking for at the moment, I am glad that I picked up and devoured Transcendent Kingdom in under a day.

Gifty is in the last year of a PhD program at Stanford. She is studying the neurological pathways in rats in hopes that she can discover a means for humans to fight off addiction. Immediately I took a liking in Gifty just as I had in Hope Jahren’s memoir last year. My dad is an engineer and I have more of an engineering brain even though it was not my chosen career. I find scientific processes to be fascinating, encouraged when it is women making these discoveries in fields that had been closed to us for countless generations. Gifty might be a fictional character, Gyasi developed her through collaboration with a friend who is indeed in a PhD program at Stanford and has had her work published in Cell magazine. Gifty is the resulting composite when Gyasi combines her friend’s scientific mind with her own literary one. Although others noted that it was tricky to read about the countless lab experiments, I found them to be refreshing as they represented Gifty’s respite from the rest of her life, which has been littered with loss. Even though the scientific portions of this book may have been tedious for some, for me they represented hope for Gifty in her life overall after an early lifetime of sadness.

Gifty’s mother immigrated from Ghana to Alabama to give her older brother Nana to the world. She believed that he had infinitely better opportunities in the United States than Ghana and left against the better wishes of her husband. The only jobs that Gifty’s parents could get in Alabama were those of menial labor as they navigated the nexus of both being immigrants and the targets of others’ racist beliefs. Gifty’s mother somehow stuck it out, finding refuge in a fundamentalist church, whereas her father returned to Ghana for good when Nana was ten and impressionable and Gifty was five. It was apparent early on that the father was the happier, more laid back parent, and both children were better cared for in his presence. Once he left, it wrecked their home life, and Nana as an adolescent male was never able to recover. He found somewhat of a comradeship in sports, but as the only African American on the team, he stuck out, irking other parents in the stands. Eventually Nana got sucked into the opioid crisis after being given prescription drugs for a sports related injury. With no male role model to help him, Nana was forced to navigate his recovery on his own; however, it was not meant to be. I do believe that Nana is based on Gyasi’s own brother because in her acknowledgments in Homegoing she notes her one brother and the one no longer with her whose spirit lives on. Writing Gifty’s character is perhaps a way for Gyasi to cope with her own loss, one that will never quite go away.

After a lifetime of growing up in a home mired by a nexus of sadness, the difficulty in being immigrants, and a church where she did not quite fit in, Gifty desired to get as far away from Huntsville as possible. Normally, being accepted into Harvard would be a cause to rejoice in a family, but for Gifty it was relief to get away from her mother not being able to cope with the death of a sibling. Being shielded by the fundamentalists for years, Gifty was unlearned in ways of the world, and it showed during her first year of college. Her lone coping mechanism prior to being immersed in a lab was to keep a journal, addressing it to G-D. Some of the early entries, especially before Nana’s death, were cute, written in the hand of a child under ten. Then, Gifty gradually stopped believing in G-D, the journal entries trickling to a stop as well. Eventually, she would find her niche in the labs of Harvard and Stanford where she would find people who accepted her for being Gifty. This was a long, arduous process full of raw emotions; many of my goodreads friends noted for this reason that I should stay away from Gifty’s story for now. Coping through her work, however, Gifty perseveres, making this book as uplifting at times as it was depressing.

This world needs more people like Christina Kim, whose research Gifty’s is based on. The world also needs Yaa Gyasi to tell more of her stories. Homegoing was a thrilling ride as it told a family history all the way back to Ghana. Transcendent Kingdom was even more emotional, as it took more for Gyasi to tell this story which is based on too many personal experiences. Immigration is not as easy as finding the American dream, as is depicted in many immigrants’ tales. Gyasi tells how her parents, educated people, could do little more than work as home health aides and janitors, pinching pennies for years. Thankfully she made it, her brother not so much, succumbing to a nexus of problems. After producing two winners with her first two books, I wonder what Yaa Gyasi has for an encore. I know whenever she comes out with new material, I will be there to read it; it will be worth the wait.

🇬🇭 4+ stars 🧪 ...more

107 likes · Like · see review

Jan 09, 2021 Maureen rated it really liked it

3.5 rounded to 4 stars
First I must say that I just loved Honegoing by this author. My expectations were high for this book., but for some reason I struggled to stay focused with this story.

This book is told in the voice of Gifty, a sixth year PHD student at Stanford University. Her Family immigrated from Gianna to Alabama. They hoped for a better world in America.
This is the story of addiction, race, faith, loneliness and depression.
It goes back and forth in time with no structure at all and was ...more

17 likes · Like · see review

Apr 10, 2022 Celia rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio, 2022-read, ten-year-challenge, 2020-pub, kindle-list, elyse-review, literary-fiction, 2022-kindle-counted

Addiction to opioids is a terrible curse. Not only is the one addicted hurt but his/her family as well. In Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi, we see the affects on Nana, the son, and on his sister Gifty and their mother.

The book is narrated by Gifty, a 28-year-old neuroscience PhD student, and her severely depressed, Ghanaian-born mother. When the latter comes to visit after another depressive episode, Gifty is sparked into a series of reflections on what led her there and the narrative of her f ...more

9 likes · Like · see review