The Librarian's Husband's Book Club discussion

Share your reviews or post-reading thoughts about the August book selection, James.

Please make use of the spoilers function ([spoiler]...[/spoiler] but replace [] with <>) as appropriate to be sure we don't ruin parts of the book for others.

I was extremely disappointed with this one. This was the first book of Everett's I'd read. I should look for another one, but I don't know when I'd get around to it.

Anyway, here's my review.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

It seemed that Everett has a story he wanted to tell, but the Huckleberry Finn angle was something that sounded like a good idea, but he had nowhere to go with it.

This was a choice for our local book club. While I dont remember James from reading Huck Finn in my childhood, it was interesting to read his story now. I liked James a lot, his character, his sense of humor and his wit, while being in a horrible situation he held his dignity and smarts. 4 ⭐️from me.

Of the two books this month, I enjoyed James more. Was interesting to see the very different lives and interactions depending on who was watching. An interesting twist on the original story.

I loved James - just one more wonderful book from Percival Everett. He is full of satire - just like Mark Twain - and Twain would be delighted to read this book. Both write beyond the first view. Think about them and you will see that both of them made fun of the pretense of a civil society during slavery times. Slavery was not fun and millions suffered through it but what joy to read James and realize that some slaves made fun of their captors beyond their backs. It is a little like when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Korea in the 1970. Korea was "led" by a dictator - people disappeared, students who led demonstrations were killed, beaten, etc. so someone long before me gave Park Chung Hee a name. I think it was Fred or Oscar or some nominal first American name. Out in public PCVs would use that name rather than the actual name of the dictator when we were talking about him or speculating or spreading rumors. We knew the meaning of what we were saying but Koreans and even other English speaking folks (i.e., missionaries of all denominations, business people from other countries, U.S. Army personnel, tourists, etc.) did not have a clue what we were talking about. This book points out so eloquently that slave owners treated their slaves as dumb, unlearned, maybe incapable of learning, and refused to try to teach them. In fact, many slave owners forbid their slaves from learning to read or write or accomplish anything with math and would punish them if they tried and would punish those who tried to teach them. This book just points out that blacks can learn as well, as much, as deeply as people of other colors. That is why James had to share classical literature. I feel certain that many slaves were smarter than the people who owned them. Just as now - some politicians want you to believe that the "dreaded immigrants" eat pets. Pure Nonsense - I know that most people do not believe that and I suspect that most adults who were not bigots back in the time of Huckleberry Finn knew that black slaves were as smart as they were. It is very hard to cure the disease of "stupid" - we can just call it out when we see it, like leperosy. I am only responding to an earlier statement that their was nothing worth while in the book. Although, I do wonder why people with no education are on this listserv. What benefit? peace, janz

I only mean of offend the one person on this listserv who could see nothing in the book. peace, janz

I finally received this from Libby. I knew it wasn't going to be a book of reread as I'm not a huge Huck Finn fan. With that said, I really did get invested in the story. I was rooting for Jim and Huck to accomplish all that Jim wanted.

Huck is an enjoyable character, but it was a well imagined premise to follow Jim. His adventures being a tenor, meeting men that would help and those that wouldn't. Fun telling of Huck Finn from Jim's perspective. I will suggest to certain readers.

I gave it 4 stars.

I just added this to my want-to-read list, based on much of what was said here (and then some).

I finished; sorry I didn't read it during the month we picked it.

My thoughts: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...