Another Brooklyn (2016) is a novel by American author Jacqueline Woodson. The 2018-2019 Library of Congress National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature frequently writes about issue-oriented themes, such as interracial relationships and homosexuality, often challenging the literary taboos that existed at the time her various works were released. Gender, social, and racial issues are frequent topics as Woodson creates realistic characters searching for self.
As the book opens, August returns to Brooklyn in order to tend to the funeral of her father. This is two decades after significant times in her childhood. She is with her younger brother who follows the Nation of Islam. As they share a meal he tries to get August to turn to faith to deal with her current situation. As they ride the subway to their father’s apartment in order to clean it out, August sees a woman …show more content…
She has relationships with men and women and does a lot of traveling. When early in her college career she sees Angela on television, she is pleased that at least one of her group has made it out of their shared past. The book concludes with a flashback scene in which August, her brother, and their father return to Sweet Grove and visit the body of water where her mother drowned. To August, life is a journey home and there everything becomes memory.
The New York Times said of Another Brooklyn, “Woodson brings the reader so close to her young characters that you can smell the bubble gum on their breath and feel their lips as they brush against your ear. This is both the triumph and challenge of this powerfully insightful novel. ‘This is memory,’ we are reminded. But this is also the here and now. There is no time to take a few paces back and enjoy the comforts of hindsight. The present, we are repeatedly reminded, is no balm for the wounds of the
As the book opens, August returns to Brooklyn in order to tend to the funeral of her father. This is two decades after significant times in her childhood. She is with her younger brother who follows the Nation of Islam. As they share a meal he tries to get August to turn to faith to deal with her current situation. As they ride the subway to their father’s apartment in order to clean it out, August sees a woman …show more content…
She has relationships with men and women and does a lot of traveling. When early in her college career she sees Angela on television, she is pleased that at least one of her group has made it out of their shared past. The book concludes with a flashback scene in which August, her brother, and their father return to Sweet Grove and visit the body of water where her mother drowned. To August, life is a journey home and there everything becomes memory.
The New York Times said of Another Brooklyn, “Woodson brings the reader so close to her young characters that you can smell the bubble gum on their breath and feel their lips as they brush against your ear. This is both the triumph and challenge of this powerfully insightful novel. ‘This is memory,’ we are reminded. But this is also the here and now. There is no time to take a few paces back and enjoy the comforts of hindsight. The present, we are repeatedly reminded, is no balm for the wounds of the