Nigh. Sleep. Death. The Stars is a gripping examination of contemporary America through the prism of a family tragedy: when a powerful parent dies, each of his adult children reacts in startling and unexpected ways, and his grieving widow in the most surprising way of all.
Stark and penetrating, Joyce Carol Oates's latest novel is a vivid exploration of race, psychological trauma, class warfare, grief, and eventual healing, as well as an intimate family novel in the tradition of the author's bestselling We Were the Mulvaneys.
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[Why? Because he'd seen something he had reason to believe was wrong and it was within his power or at any rate it was his moral obligation to rectify it, or to make that effort]***
(@HarperCollinsUK, 11 June 2020, 928 pages, hardback, bought from @AmazonUK)
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JCO is one of my favourite writers so I couldn't wait to read this book. For some reason, I thought this was a collection of short stories. I've no idea where I got that impression. I didn't read the blurb before I pre-ordered. I don't when it's one of my favourite writers. So I was surprised when this huge doorstop of a novel arrived on my doorstep, so heavy I had to read it by leaning the book on a small table because my arms started to ache after holding the book for too long. I knew I was going to love this book after the intense opening when an elderly man, innocent, sees two police officers beating a young Indian man and pulls over to stop them, not expecting them to turn savagely on him. JCO could not have picked a more current and contentious subject matter for her latest novel. I assumed the book would focus on the police officers being punished in some way but it doesn't. Instead, the novel deals with the aftermath of death and grief on the man's large family. This is an incredible book and is up there with JCO's finest including Little Bird of Heaven and We Were the Mulvaneys.
