Mudbound

I've finally finished Mudbound by Hillary Jordan.   Now, when I say finally, I don't want you to get any wrong ideas.  I know that it sounds like it was a struggle to get through.  However, that was NOT the case.  I say finally b/c sometimes your own life makes a book a struggle to get through.  Sometimes you have so many things going on that you rarely get to sit down and read a book.  Sometimes you are so exhausted at night that it is impossible to think of reading a chapter or even a page.  Those sometimes have been my life lately.  It's kind of ridiculous if you ask me.  I mean, I stay at home with my little girl now.  I'm not working.  Therefore, you'd think I'd have all the time in the world.  However, contrary to popular belief, a stay-at-home mom is incredibly busy.  I honestly would've never thought that before I was one, but it is true.  You are busy and sometimes it is hard to find time to do even your favorite things.

However, let's get back to Mudbound.  My good friend Courtney told me about this book and then ended up giving it to me for my birthday.  We were talking about the book and the movie The Help. She was telling me that Mudbound was kind of like it.  It's a historical fiction set in the deep south, in Mississippi, at a time just a little bit before The Help.  It's set just after World War II.  Courtney had thought that if you liked The Help then you'd like Mudbound, and I would have to agree with her.  There are similar themes in the story, race equality being one of them, but it is a completely different story as well.  Mudbound is a fabulously written book; it is well worth your time to read the book.

Jordan chose to write this book in a very difficult format to pull off.  She wrote each chapter from a different characters perspective.  However, she was still able to give a seamless feel to the book.  You still felt connected to the characters, but you end up feeling connected to even more of the characters.  Within each chapter she kept the story going, but yet she was able to give background information on that character to explain who they were and why they are the way they are.  It is impressive writing b/c, in my opinion, it is difficult to pull off successfully.  This was my first time reading something by Hillary Jordan, but I am impressed with her writing, and I like her style.

Now, to give you a little more about the book.  I'll share Amazon's book description.  It doesn't give too much away, and I personally think it leaves you a little confused about the book, but it gives you a slight sampling of it.

"In Jordan's prize-winning debut, prejudice takes many forms, both subtle and brutal. It is 1946, and city-bred Laura McAllan is trying to raise her children on her husband's Mississippi Delta farm—a place she finds foreign and frightening. In the midst of the family's struggles, two young men return from the war to work the land. Jamie McAllan, Laura's brother-in-law, is everything her husband is not—charming, handsome, and haunted by his memories of combat. Ronsel Jackson, eldest son of the black sharecroppers who live on the McAllan farm, has come home with the shine of a war hero. But no matter his bravery in defense of his country, he is still considered less than a man in the Jim Crow South. It is the unlikely friendship of these brothers-in-arms that drives this powerful novel to its inexorable conclusion.


The men and women of each family relate their versions of events and we are drawn into their lives as they become players in a tragedy on the grandest scale. As Kingsolver says of Hillary Jordan, "Her characters walked straight out of 1940s Mississippi and into the part of my brain where sympathy and anger and love reside, leaving my heart racing. They are with me still." 

There's a lot of depth to this short novel, and it is worth however long it takes you to read it.  Definitely check this one out.  Thanks Courtney for the great book!