Book Reviews of The Known World

Just because a book has won a pulitzer prize and everyone around you says its a great book does not make it a good read. I found the prose hard to digest and the story drawn out and frankly boring. The characters seemeed one dimensional and there far too many tangents.

Pulitzer Prize winner for 2004, this book is a rich portrayal of slavery and free blacks during the mid-1800s in the US. No Civil War militaria, this book is a profound and deep look of the lives of slaves and their masters--some of whom are black. Left me thinking of the characters long after finishing the book.

I got lost in the book. I became fully involved with the characters and the wonder of the human spirit in all of us. One of the best books I have ever read.

Jones brings you deep into the world of the confused South through his beautiful, dramatic, illustrations of life as it was for slaves - both in bondage and freed - and their owners - both white and black. This is a fabulous book that was hard to put down.

It's easy to understand why the Pulitzer Prize was given to this wonderful novel. It manages to be epic while neatly confined to small town Virginia.

My husband and I listened to this book on CD while traveling. The story is not a happy one, so don't read it if you're looking for something uplifting. However, it is a very well written book, deeply moving, depicting what it must have been like during the dark days of slavery in America.

After you refer to the character guide in the back this book is much easier to follow. Pulitzer winner.

More historical than fictional; very intriguing angle on slavery. A bit pedantic, but really gave me a different perspective.

Good historical novel about the little-known culture of slave-owning blacks in the South. Storyline tends to shift around a lot but it's not so hard to follow if you are paying attention! Pulitzer Prize winning book.

Even the stifling boredom of a day filled with airports and flights was not enough to force me to finish this snoozer.

This is the story of Henry Townsend, a freed black slave, who goes on to buy his own plantation and own slaves. We then get vignettes of all of the people who are remotely related to Henry at any point in his life. It's tedious. A lot of the book feels like stream-of-consciousness writing and it just plain doesn't make sense. It was interesting to get a glimpse at the life of free black families just before the Civil War, but I had to power through this book to finish. I would not recommend it.

I really enjoyed ths book a lot. Well written and thought-provoking.

A look at history through the story of free black man during the days of slavery

I found this book remarkable. It's about a piece of history, I didn't realize truly existed. I had a hard time putting it down.

"The Known World" has an interesting premise in that the slave owners are the same race as the slaves. A lot of the incidents in this book are very eye-opening. I never really thought about what happens to slaves when their master dies. It is so amazing to me that people feel that they have a right to own their fellow human beings, treating as possessions instead of humans. Another part of the book that I found disturbing was the idea that slaves should not be educated. This dehumanization of the slaves had a lot of similarities with Nazi Germany...For anyone who enjoys fiction in a historical setting, "The Known World" by Edward Jones, is required reading.

Enlightening, depressing, hopeful, informative. Any book that can pull off that combination is a great book. As far as historical fiction goes, this is on the top of the list.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Literature, the book powerful in its examination of the issue of slavery and in its characters.

I couldn't put it down!

Interesting story about an aspect of slavery that I had not been aware of--African-American slave holders.

I had a hard time getting into this book. It was slow at the beginning and many characters to keep track of. However, the story was interesting and it was still a good read.

There's no question why this book was a Pulitzer Prize winner. It's such a great book.

Diane Rehm (of NPR) discusses this book with guests on her show--I enjoyed their conversation so much that I picked up the book. A good read that would prompt good discussion. (You can listen to an archived broadcast of Diane Rehm's show on the NPR site.)

This historically based fiction examines the generational effect of slavery in Virginia through the life of a former slave owning land and other slaves in a changing atmosphere of fear and resentment.

Absolutely original. Incredibly enlightening.

I heard this on CD. Had no trouble sorting out the characters, which I do sometimes have trouble with in other books. Compelling book. Enjoyed it immensely!

Set in Manchester County, Virginia, 20 years before the Civil War began, Edward P. Jones's debut novel, The Known World, is a masterpiece of overlapping plot lines, time shifts, and heartbreaking details of life under slavery. Caldonia Townsend is an educated black slaveowner, the widow of a well-loved young farmer named Henry, whose parents had bought their own freedom, and then freed their son, only to watch him buy himself a slave as soon as he had saved enough money. Although a fair and gentle master by the standards of the day, Henry Townsend had learned from former master about the proper distance to keep from one's property. After his death, his slaves wonder if Caldonia will free them. When she fails to do so, but instead breaches the code that keeps them separate from her, a little piece of Manchester County begins to unravel. Impossible to rush through, The Known World is a complex, beautifully written novel with a large cast of characters, rewarding the patient reader with unexpected connections, some reaching into the present day. --Regina Marler, Amazon.com

very interesting account of slavery in the US South. a little hard to follow but has character list in the back which was very helpful.

A complicated story about slavery, people, et. I had a lot of trouble keeping the characters stright.

Since I had a difficult time getting into this book I thought I'd read other people's thoughts... they called it "non-lateral" fiction. I guess that's a good description for me too. I tried a few times to get into the book, but it's hard reading, lots of nitty gritty detail, hard to keep a story line in my head. I gave up reading it!

Nice fiction book on early slave culture in America

Brilliant historical novel, set in Virginia in the 1840s, of black families who owned slaves. Amazing.

Has quite a lot of characters, but well worth the read. If I had flipped to the back of the book to get the Dramatis Personae before reading the book, it wouldn't have been so hard to remember characters and their relationships with other characters.

Intersting look at the impact of slavery and its impact on a former slave turned farmer and his family.

Perfect. Powerful and stark without commentary - just the story of pain, of life, of the way it was.

This book was worth reading! It won the PULITZER for 2004.

This is the story of Henry Townsend, a black farmer and slave holder who runs his affairs with unusual discipline. When he dies unexpectedly, chaos ensues. Described as a daring novel that takes an unflinching look at slavry in all its moral complexities. It's no wonder the book won a Pulitzer Prize, was a national best seller and an Oprah selection.

The unusual story of master/slave relations in the antebellum American south.

Written by a Pulitzer prize winning author who takes you deep into the life of a black farmer, a former slave, and his wife who struggles to make her life work when he suddenly dies. Edward Jones stabs us in the heart with his bold commentary on slavery.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for literature. A powerful story of slavery that will surprise you.

Fascinating look at slavery from multiple viewpoints of slaves and others.
it really makes you think and is certainly deserving of the awards it has won. If you find it a bit off-putting at first due to the various different stories stick with it and you will find it worth it.

The story of Henry Townsend, a black farmer and former slave who falls under the tutelage of William Robbins, the most powerful man in Manchester County, Virginia. Townsend becomes a slaveholder and runs his affairs with unusual discipline. When death takes him unexpectedly, his widow, Caldonia, can't uphold the estate's order and chaos ensues.- I was unaware that during the pre-Civil War era there was a small population of blacks, many of whom were freed slaves, that became slave-owners themselves. The book begins slow, with seemingly unrelated storylines that appear to run independent of one another. Stick with the story and be amazed as all these story "threads" begin to weave together. A wonderful read!
Elaine Wilson

A stunner - a little hard to get going, perhaps, but really worthwhile when you do.

A very interesting perspective of pre-Civil war plantation life in the South. The main characters are black slave owners. There are a myriad of characters whose lives are interconnected. It to some degree takes race out of southern slavery--i.e. slavery is appalling no matter who practices it.

I quote a back-cover blurb because I can't say it better myself:
"Brilliant ... So utterly original that it makes most everything previously written about slavery seem outdated and pedestrian. It belongs on a shelf with other classics of slavery, like Toni Morrison's Beloved..." This is so much more than the story of a black farmer and former slave who owns slaves and how his widow manages the estate when he dies. So much more. The Cold Mountain of slaves in Virginia. Absolutely stunning.

If you ever wanted to read a realistic story about black history, then this is the one to read. Well written and a good story, I felt the tale to the depths of my soul.

This Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel requires patience and a willingness to follow a narrative that's nonlinear. It also helps if you keep the list of characters in the back material nearby, since the book is heavily populated. The prose style's got overtones of the King James Bible. If you like Faulkner and Toni Morrison's "Beloved," the book may appeal to you. I was also reminded a bit of E.L. Doctorow's "Rag Time." But the attraction for me was the structure and telling. It's the story of a whole community and traces how everyone's lives are intertwined. Thus, everyone bears some responsibility for what happens. There are no easy moral judgments here. People who are a very complex mix of good and bad do unbearable things to one another here. This subtle, cumulative condemnation of slavery for the way it warped thinking and behavior is extremely powerful. And the nonlinear telling reminded me of hearing some kind of oral rendition. As if a storyteller within the community had started by trying to give one person's history, but found himself continually led off on associations to further fascinating anecdotes, thinking of this and then of that, leaping from that person's appearance to that person's eventual fate or death, sometimes giving the highlights of a whole life within one paragraph. Which is why it requires patience, because one story sets off another. In the end, they are all related. There are also some magical and supernatural elements in the book, as there always must be, in such tellings. A brilliant book, but not for everyone, because of this very large cast and the many tangents the author hies off on. As for me, I agree with the Pulitzer committee. This one's brilliant.

Could not get into this book.

Black people owning slaves? Humm, they sure don’t teach our children that in school. White people didn’t invent slavery, they abolished it!

A wonderful book about the brutal history of slavery in our country,

Great read!!

Pulitzer-prize winning book about slavery. Great characters, fascinating story.

I haven't read this yet but I have another copy that is on my "to read" list. Won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2004 and a bazillion other awards. Deals with slavery from the perspesctive of the black slave owner. Very interesting and well written book.

This book touches on a little-known topic - free slaves who own slaves of their own.. This book is a winner of the Pulitzer prize.

Pultizer prize winning novel about the struggles of slavery.

Fascinating story about a little known piece of American history. My bookclub read this and most everyone loved it.

bought for a class but then didn't read

Great read!

The world of slavery and the lives of slaves and free blacks is opened up and given voice and life in this very moving novel. One of my favorites reads for the year.

A noble attempt on interesting subject matter (a Pulitzer-winner in the judges' minds), but one that missed the mark with me for its overpopulation and/or underdevelopment of characters.

Pultizer prize winning book. A lot of characters to follow but a very interesting fictional account of a freed black man who owns slaves.

Amazing tale of a slave and his life in pre-civil war Virginia.

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