The April bookclub read was Kindred, I chose this because it fitted with the April newsletter theme “Oldie but Goldie.” Kindred has been on my bookshelf since lockdown but I’ve lacked the emotional energy to read it. I thought that dedicating it to bookclub meant that we would be committed and then if enjoyed it we could watch the TV adaptation thats been added onto Disney. But in all honesty I struggled so much with the violence that I’m not too sure whether I will be able to watch the show.
As always this post will contain spoilers, so if you are yet to read please bookmark and come back here once you’ve finished.
It is for sure a hard read, and because of that I’m finding hard to articulate how I actually felt about the book. I really enjoyed reading something different to what I have read before. As a book that has been described as science fiction I felt that there would be more of this element to it, for me it wasn’t really science fiction other than the time travel. It was more historical fiction, with tiny snippets set in the 70s.
Although the book was written in 79 but Dana the protagonist felt very much like a modern woman. I did feel like I wanted to get to know her as a person, more of her story prior to her time travelling. For me it kept throwing her back to 1815 where we learnt how quickly she had to become complicit in slavery to survive. But I thought that it lacked telling any story of her modern day, I would loved to have had the contrast or at least some more context of how she was surviving or thriving in her modern day life. We see a snippet of her as a writer and her meeting her husband, but I wanted a better balance.
I did love the concept that she was travelling back in time to protect her family ancestry, at first though I don’t think I actually appreciated what this meant. Naively when we first met Rufus I had high hopes that Dana could get him to break the cycle. His father was repulsive and terrifying, the fact that he hated him I thought was clues to him rejecting his beliefs, treatment of slaves and that he would turn out to be a nice white man. I also REALLY niavely thought that Rufus and Alice would fall in love, that a sub plot was going to be a love affair, that they would happily live together have consensual children not even considering whether these children would be classed as slaves or free.
I’m glad that Rufus turned out to be a little shit. It felt much more real and for me each time Dana was returning I was convinced he would do better. It also stopped the book feeling like it was written to be palatable for white people. It really did a fantastic job of letting the reader feel that they were part of the story, I felt so anxious each time she arrived just desperate for her safe return.
I found Dana and Rufus’ relationship hard to understand, how she was actively saving the life of someone who was enslaving and raping her ancestors. I struggled to believe the relationship that Dana and Rufus had with each other, I’m not sure how kind I could be to someone who was that nasty to me on multiple times. I found it hard how easily she accepted and slotted into slavery but in reality she had no choice and I’m not sure what I expected her to do. I thought that her and her husband would touch on this more, but as Dana didn’t spend a lot of time in the present there were little opportunities to be able to discuss in depth.
Overall I felt that the book was good, I enjoyed reading something that is older and has stood the test of time, as well as having a current resurgence. As I previously said the only change I would have made to the book was that I would have liked more time in the 70s/present day, whether that was between travels or before/after to help us discover who Dana was without slavery.
Did you read the book? What did you think? Let me know!