What does it mean to explore identity, legacy, and the complexities of family through a literary lens? For our January book club episode of Unabridged, join us as we discuss Percival Everett’s James.
This inventive retelling of Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn reimagines the story from Jim’s perspective, giving voice to a character often overshadowed in the original. Packed with humor, grief, and rich reflection, Everett’s novel invites readers to explore themes of race, agency, and storytelling in a whole new way. Don’t miss this engaging conversation about a brilliant book that will be discussed for many years to come.
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Bookish Check-in
Ashley - Jennifer Lynn Barnes’ The Inheritance Games (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Jen - Alan Bradley’s What Time the Sexton’s Spade Doth Rust  (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Book Club Pick
Percival Everett's James  (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Our Pairings
Ashley - Pat Barker’s Silence of the Girls  (Bookshop.org | Libro.fm)
Jen - Jon Clinch’s Finn (Libro.fm)
Other Mentions
These are the articles we referenced in the episode:
Unabridged Favorites
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:32]Â Jen:Â Hi everyone. Welcome Today is our January 2025 book club episode and we are talking about Percival Everett's James. We are so excited to discuss this book. Before we get started, though, I want to remind everybody about our Patreon shop where, even if you don't want to have an ongoing Patreon subscription, you can buy things one at a time.
[00:00:56]Â So you can buy different guides that we've made up. We do encourage you to check out supporting us on Patreon where you can access episodes that we've recorded and an array of other guides. But whichever you choose to do, we hope that you check it out at patreon. com slash unabridged pod. We appreciate all of your support.
[00:01:15] Ashley: All right. To start off today's episode, we're going to do our Bookish Check-in. Ashley, what are you reading? So I realized as I was reflecting on end of the year reading, especially fall, I was like, Ooh, I am really a little bit in a slump. And so I've been trying to pick up books that I knew would be very quick and kind of fast paced. And so I went back to Jennifer Lynn Barnes's The Inheritance Games.Jen and shared before how much she loved this, and I loved The Killer Instinct series and read all of that, and this one, I do think I'd put a hold in a long time ago on the library and I feel like it has come up once or twice but I've done that like send it to me later thing, and anyway, it came around on my library hauls and I was like yes this seems like a perfect time to read this.
[00:02:01]Â So it is, I've only read a little bit but I am really enjoying it. It's Avery Grambs is the character.. She is really, her life is just really hard circumstances. She's trying to get through high school. She has an older half sister who is trying to help her, but she otherwise is very much alone. Libby, her sister, is also having really hard circumstances, and so while she's trying care for Avery, she's not really able to do that.
[00:02:33]Â And so we see right away that they have hard circumstances all around. Avery gets this summons to come to the reading of a will of someone named Tobias Hawthorne. And Tobias Hawthorne is a billionaire, but she has never heard of the family. She has no idea why she needs to attend. And they are pretty annoyed by the time she finally gets the notice because they cannot have the will read until she comes to attend, and apparently there have been all these attempts to contact her and they kind of were going through Libby, she's living out of her car at times, so you know, she's just not in a circumstance where she's easy to reach.
[00:03:15]Â So she and Libby go together to the reading of this will in Texas. And the family all comes together and Again, I haven't read much at all yet, but it reminds me a lot of the movie Knives Out, where it's just like this very interesting gathering of very controversial people who clearly have very fraught relationships.
[00:03:40]Â And again, Avery has no idea who any of them are, and furthermore, they have no idea why she's there. And they read out the will, and holy moly, it is a shocking reading, and it is very much in Avery's favor. Even though, again, she has no idea what her connection is to Tobias Hawthorne. So I am very intrigued.
[00:04:04]Â It is fast moving, it's very interesting, and I have no clue at this point why on earth things have come to pass the way that they have, or what it's going to mean for her. But it does have these vibes that I really, like, I loved that movie. I felt like it had such fun, interesting vibes, and it just feels similar so far that, you know, very fraught circumstances.
[00:04:26]Â Seems like it should be great for Avery that she... I mean, you know, it feels like winning the lottery times ten. But, you also have this sense of foreboding. Clearly, the family is not prepared to just walk away. And they are used to getting their way, whereas Avery is used to having the world walk on top of her.
[00:04:47]Â So, yeah. It's just very interesting class dynamics and a very mysterious set of circumstances that she finds herself in. And so yes, I am here for it. This has been a great choice for me for a winter read. And again, that is Jennifer Lynn Barnes's The Inheritance Games. And a lot of you have probably already read it.
[00:05:05]Â I have no idea what is to come, but I am really enjoying it.
[00:05:08]Â Jen:Â Oh, I had to repress a squeal of delight when I saw that this was your Bookish Check In book. I love this series so much. It is so much fun. And so there's the original trilogy and now she has the spinoff series. So the goodness continues. Yeah. You have such a fun ride in front of you. I'm so excited.
[00:05:26]Â Ashley:Â I'm excited. I'm like, this is what I needed. And I, that's something I enjoy about. reflecting as we come to the close of a year and looking toward a new year is like noticing like, oh, I have been... I didn't feel like I was in a slump, but I just had started to realize that I wasn't reading things I was particularly enjoying.
[00:05:43]Â We looked at our last half of the year to pull out some favorites and I was like, man, I just don't have that many. And so I think I started to think, okay, what can kind of help me just through the winter, through some of our tumultuous circumstances that are happening around us, and what can kind of get me on the track again of... then I can dive into some of these deeper and more thought provoking... Not that Jennifer Lynn Barnes doesn't have thought provoking parts. I think she does, so I don't want to discredit, but I think I have got to get my momentum going again
[00:06:12]Â as we're coming into this new year, and then I can think about, okay, what are some literary fiction opportunities that I really want to fit in. So,
[00:06:20]Â Jen:Â Yeah,
[00:06:20]Â Ashley:Â That's where I am.
[00:06:21]Â am. What about you, Jen? what's something that you're reading?
[00:06:23]Â Jen:Â So I am reading Alan Bradley's What Time the Sexton's Spade Doth Rust, which is quite the title. I know this is book 11 in the Flavia De Luce series, which I... It is such a comfort read for me. I love the series so much. So it is book 11, so I won't spoil anything that happens in the ongoing story, but Flavia De Luce is a young girl who has
[00:06:49]Â an outsized interest in poison and because, of that and her
[00:06:55]Â inheritance. Yes. Yes, So she inherited her great uncle's chemistry lab at this estate in post, I think it's post World War I England. So her family is one of those families that has this huge estate but does not have a lot of money to run the estate, and her parental situation is very complicated.
[00:07:18]Â Some of that's spoilery, so I won't get into that, but at its heart this is a mystery series, and Flavia is a young girl. Her young cousin has come to live in this estate and desperately wants attention from Flavia and so When this man named Major Goodenall dies of poison, Flavia and Undine are pulled into the investigation, against the will of the constable, of course, who does not want these girls... But they decide to insert themselves nonetheless.
[00:07:49]Â And I cannot recommend the audio of these enough. Jane Entwistle is the narrator of all of them. and the way she captures the precociousness of Flavia's voice is absolute perfection. Flavia is incredibly snarky and is convinced that she's smarter than everyone, and she is smarter than a lot of people. And so it's so much fun to hear her out thinking these adults.
[00:08:14]Â Anyway, it is really great. So that is Alan Bradley's What Time the Sexton's Spade Doth Rust, though, of course, you should start at the beginning if you have not read the series.
[00:08:24]Â Ashley:Â Oh, I love that, Jen. I've only done book one, and I love Jane Entwistle, and I definitely want to listen to more. I can't remember, I might have read that one on my, on my e reader instead, but anyway, that sounds like a lot of
[00:08:39]Â Jen:Â Yeah, they're great. All right. Well, we are going to launch into our book club discussion now. First, I'll start with the publishers synopsis: A brilliant action packed reimagining of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, both harrowing and ferociously funny, told from the enslaved Jim's point of view.
[00:08:56]Â When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, He decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father, recently returned to town.
[00:09:13] As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and too often unreliable promise of the free states and beyond. While many narrative set pieces of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn remain in place: floods and storms, stumbling across with unexpected death and unexpected treasure in the myriad stopping points along the river's banks, encountering the scam artists posing as the Duke and Dauphin, Jim's agency, intelligence, and compassion are shown in a radically new light.
[00:09:45]Â All right, Ashley, what are your overall impressions of James?
[00:09:50]Â Ashley:Â My gosh. This is a brilliant work. We talked in our last episode, on the Let Chat Game, it just happened to be about a book that we think will be a classic to be read forever. And I, this immediately came to my mind. This was my second reading. I feel like I could read it another 10 times and pick up new things each time.
[00:10:12]Â I am amazed by how Everett manages to create something that is light, funny, heart wrenching and powerful all at the same time. I mean, there are parts that are laugh-out-loud funny, and James is funny. I mean, he, in his narration, there is this humor. He is able to see all the layers. I mean, he is a brilliant man, and we get to experience all of the layers of that, but I think that's what's striking to me... Also it's short. I mean, I think another thing that is shocking to me is how much power there is in a book that is also so tightly woven.
[00:10:58]Â And so, I mean, overall impression, like, I thought that the first time I read it, I was like, this is the best book I've read all year. Probably the best book I've read in several years, second reading absolutely holds up. I mean, I just think the way that Everett, and we'll get into this, but in short, the way that Everett is able to take a story that people know, and tell it in a totally new way that sheds all kinds of new light on the original story is just masterful.
[00:11:32]Â Thank you. What about you, Jen? Overall?
[00:11:35]Â Jen:Â Yeah. Yeah. I would echo so much of what you said. I think anytime I sit down to read literary fiction, there's a little gearing up. And I didn't need to do that with James. I did, because I... So the first time I read it as an audiobook and it was amazing hearing Jim's dialect when he is speaking in dialect and then that switch to the voice, his authentic voice, is so powerful
[00:12:01] on audio. And this time I chose to read the print, and I emptied a whole tin of book darts because it is just perfect. It is perfect. It is such an amazing tribute to Huck Finn, commentary on Huck Finn, updating of Huck Finn and I think James is one of those characters who just really has stuck with me. I think he's so distinctive. I, I just, yeah, I, I... I'm almost unable to speak because it's hard to articulate everything that he does so well, but I think the way, like you said, there's humor, there's lightness in the midst of utter tragedy and you feel every moment of that tragedy and just the way Everett is able to pull you back and forth between the two and make you feel Jim's feelings is amazing.
[00:12:59]Â Ashley:Â Yeah, I think we feel the tragedy all the more because of the contrast and I also think he's able to... We never lose sight of the humanity of every character involved, and the way that they are complex people who are totally unique from each other and yet who are entrenched in this horrific system that's doing everything it can, for the Black characters in the book, to strip them of that humanity and how we see that in place in individual characters but also in every other systemic part of it.
[00:13:37]Â I think all that is just really, again, I mean, masterful.
[00:13:41]Â Jen:Â Well, and I think watching. This might be jumping in what worked for us, but a lot of things worked for me, so it'll be easy. But watching James watch Huck make sense of... try to make sense of a system that inherently does not make sense and that only makes sense because the society needs it to continue is so fascinating. Because he sees Huck's questioning and when he's teaching his own children and the children of his community,
[00:14:12]Â you can see he wants to do that for Huck as well, but because Huck is part of the white society, he cannot be as explicit in teaching him as he can his own daughter and the other enslaved children that he is teaching explicitly the rules that make the society run and that keep them under its thumb.
[00:14:33]Â And I think watching that is so powerful through the book and turns the relationship from the earlier novel on its head in the most interesting way. Because, of course, in the earlier book, Huck is struggling with some of the same questions, but we don't get Jim's perspective that he is so aware of every step in his attempts to understand the logic of something that is illogical. And just seeing that, just the way it all falls apart once you start questioning it, and that it's hard to continue believing in. It's so powerful. Yeah.
[00:15:09]Â Ashley:Â Well, and I think, this is getting into particular plot details, but when we realize that Huck is James's son, and then the way that that is not fully unpacked, right? We don't know. And I think all of that is so powerful because it forces the reader to ask really hard questions: What is the right thing to do there?
[00:15:35]Â Is there a right thing in a society that is so broken and so inhumane, does morality matter? We see with Norman, the character who is passing as white, the struggle that he has over and over again to not, you know, how he keeps saying, like, that's... I don't want that. I don't want to be part of that. And yet, he's having to deal with a set of circumstances that have put him in a situation where he's continuing to have to be part of that.
[00:16:03]Â And that whole part on the ship, and where he has to pretend that Jim is enslaved to him. I just felt like all of that is so complex. It shows, of course, how completely arbitrary the entire system is, and how everything that determines whether you are an owner or property, is completely arbitrary and yet defined by every, like, tooth and nail, right?
[00:16:34]Â I mean, every single piece of the people trying to uphold the system for their own gain is done to the Nth degree because it must be done that way in order to keep this inhumanity happening. And I just think, I mean, you see every piece of that in this book.
[00:16:52]Â Jen:Â Yeah. I'm going to jump on a quotation that I was going to read later, but I'll pick a different one. So Jim says at one point, "Folks be funny, lack that. Day takes the lies they want and throws away the truth that scares them." And I think that is such an encapsulation of what makes a society continue to run.
[00:17:09]Â If they don't want to see it, they just don't see it because they know that once you acknowledge that one truth, everything else falls apart. And so they can't acknowledge that initial truth.
[00:17:19]Â Yes, again, I could talk about it all day, I could think about this all day, and I think that Everett calls for us to examine what all of this means. And I think what's so powerful about it also is that by revisiting this historical period, this very famous novel, it forces us to look at not just the past, but now, right?
[00:17:39]Â Ashley:Â And like what it is easy for us to, as readers, see the parallels between the way that we do those things in our own society, which I think are questions we need to ask ourselves as we reflect, you know,How much of what's happening in our society is just happening because these systems are in place that people are not examining, you know?
[00:18:01]Â And so I just love that because I think, again, and exactly what you said, Jen, part of what is so powerful is it is literary fiction, but it is literary fiction that invites the reader. This is not a gatekeeping literary fiction. And not that there's not a place for stuff that is more obscure, that's more difficult to read, but I feel like what he does so well, He's diving so deep, but he's also inviting us as readers to go with him.
[00:18:25]Â Jen:Â Yes. That's a great way to say that. All right. I'm sort of feeling like we should abandon the categories for day to day, but we'll keep going. So our next category is what worked for us. What's one thing that worked for you, Ashley?
[00:18:37]Â Ashley:Â Oh my goodness. One I will hone in on is something that Jen already spoke about, which is the trained speech, the dialect, versus the way that the enslaved community really speaks. And I think that again, what is so brilliant about that is that we see... At the very beginning, that lesson with the children where he is instructing them and he uses the example of the fire.
[00:19:12]Â And he's not only teaching them the right way to say the things in order to avoid, They're speaking that way to avoid scrutiny, to avoid being beaten, to avoid being killed.
[00:19:19]Â So this is a matter of survival. And I think that we really see in the book how the speech patterns have become a part of survival. But then this idea that they are, of course, like, among themselves. Like, I think that that's just such an interesting and beautiful way to show, again, showing the layers of humanity, showing that they are, you know, despite having every resource possible removed from them.
[00:19:56]Â The enslaved people in this book are so smart and funny and kind and capable... And that they are all those things, individually but also as a group, despite every resource being denied them. And so I think we see that in that lesson at the beginning, but that part with the fire, like, I just feel like it was such a clear example of what, again, I mean when we look at history like this happened.
[00:20:22]Â all the time. Because again, part of a horrific and cruel and inhumane system is that everything is built in that they couldn't be the ones to know. So in the scene, you know, the kids are like, Oh, there's a fire. Like we probably should say, there's a fire. And he's like, well, yes, but then what do we have to do, you know, and they work their way through how they cannot say that there's a fire because there could be blame.
[00:20:48]Â There could be judgment. There could be a, like, you're talking back kind of attitude. And so then there has to be a way to alert the person, but then make the white person in the situation believe that they're the ones who figured it out. I mean, it's all that stuff that I just think is heartbreaking, and brilliant, and shows the brutality of the system at large.
[00:21:09]Â Jen:Â Yeah. I think when toward the end of the book, when there's the scene with James and the judge and the judge is in bodily peril, and yet the thing that frightens him the most is hearing Jim speak as James. As an intelligent, well educated, thoughtful person, because that is what will make the whole system that the judge has built his life around crumble.
[00:21:40]Â And I think that is such a powerful indictment of the supposedly smart people and the, I'm using air quotes here, kind people who allow the system to continue to just perpetuate. And yeah, I thought that was really brilliant to bring him in in that way. Because I do think in the original book, the judge is held up, not as a hero, but as, you know, a respectable person who's trying to do the right thing and is on Huck's side.
[00:22:13]Â And then you see him from James's point of view. And you see how corrupt he is and what corruption he has allowed to drive his every decision.
[00:22:24]Â Ashley:Â Yeah, and also just how little those shades of cruelty, the shades of inhumanity, the shades of people being terrible people... The whole society is built upon this premise that those shadings matter within the white community, that they can, like, make themselves feel better, and how, to James and to the other enslaved people, those differences are absolutely irrelevant. And yeah, it's the justification and the people who are like, again, quote unquote, like, good people who let this perpetuate for such a long time. What about you, Jen? What was one thing that really worked for you?
[00:23:02]Â Jen:Â So I want to read a quotation from an interview that Everett did. This is in Elle magazine and we'll, we'll link to it, but it's about his use of Huck Finn. Let me find the exact quote here.
[00:23:17] Ashley: And I will say while Jen's looking for that quote, we both… I re-read Huck Finn for the first time in ages. I probably had read it 15 years prior maybe for AP Lit with my students. I did it once. so it had been a long time since I visited it and I revisited that text. I think you've read it quite a few times, Jen, but I did re-read it and I mean, I certainly don't think you have to do that in order to read James and for James to have an impact, but I did enjoy looking at how the two narratives are side by side.
[00:23:45]Â Jen:Â So Everett is talking about understanding some of the politics of publishing. He says, "I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. I love that novel. It's the first modern novel. It's great. It doesn't have any deficiencies that I'm addressing. James addresses what Mark Twain would not have been able to address.
[00:24:03]Â So I got to participate in this discourse... In this American discussion of freedom, there is a distinction to be made between freedom and rights.
[00:24:11]Â It's fairly safe to say what slaves wanted was to enjoy the same rights as people who were not slaves. And I think that's still what people want, to be able to drive on the road and not have particular fears because of the way that you look as opposed to the way someone else looks. Though we all enjoy the same rights."
[00:24:27] So it goes on and there's more he says about Huck Finn, but I think what I really And I think what I really loved about this is the way he complicates some of the parts of Huck Finn that have stuck with me. So, for example, the Duke and the Dauphin. There's no doubt that in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, they are villains.
[00:24:45]Â And yet, in James, He puts the cruelty on the page even more. And we see the way that they see from the very beginning of meeting Huck and Jim, the way that relationship can go, that they are going to be able at some point to sell Jim, that they are going to be able to run right over Huck because Huck Yes, has more power than James does, but in this society ultimately is powerless as well, and that they can play on all of that to benefit.
[00:25:17]Â And so they'll keep them around as long as they can and they have no hesitation to physically abuse both of them. And I think seeing that beating and it's the second beating James has had in a very short amount of time. But seeing that beating just puts on the page something that is sort of in the subtext of Huck Finn.
[00:25:44] And I, I just think Everett does that over and over again. He takes something from the original novel, and he has new scenes. So the whole part with the minstrel group... You know, that's not in Huck Finn. There are parts that aren't in Huck Finn. There are parts in Huck Finn that don't appear in this book, but I think that Duke and the Dauphin really crystallized for me The way he's just making even more explicit the cruelty that is happening in Huck Finn the whole time.
[00:26:14]Â Ashley:Â Yeah, yeah, and I loved hearing Everett's perspective because I do think we're tempted to say, I mean, I certainly when I read James, I was tempted as a reader to say this is a correction of Huck Finn. And I love hearing him say explicitly that that's not his intent. It is instead to widen the, the larger discussion that's happening.
[00:26:39]Â And then again, I mean, he's saying outright, which I, which I, I didn't remember that from that article. But he was seeing outright what I think we see as the readers, which is what does this mean for today? And I think that the way that this one is so brilliantly written calls us to consider that and I think that's really important because again, it's these larger systems that we can be upholding unintentionally and that we are so much a part of that It's hard for us to see them.
[00:27:11]Â And so I think what's powerful here is that we can see that one, because we are removed, because the time has passed, we can look at that system, and we can judge it. And I think there is some power there.
[00:27:24] Jen: Yeah. It's interesting. So you all know I love the Book Riot podcast. And so recently as they've been working through, as Jeff and Rebecca have been working through their favorite books of the year, James is on the list. And one thing they were talking about is that in the Goodreads vote voting, James was listed as historical fiction and that that is... And it did not win historical fiction, by the way, but that is wrong because it is doing so much more than just depicting the era, and not that there's anything wrong with that.
[00:27:52]Â I love historical fiction, but that is not the intention of this book. This book is operating on so many complex levels because it is so much a commentary about today and it's about the experience of reading the earlier book. And it's just doing so many things that to, say it is just, not in a negative way, but the only historical fiction is wrong.
[00:28:18]Â And I thought that was a really interesting conversation, but I think that lines up so well with everything that you're saying, Ashley.
[00:28:24]Â Ashley:Â Yeah. Man. Yeah. I just, I mean, I just think it's brilliant. But I do love hearing his intent, and knowing what he as the author was thinking, I feel like it just further complements the reading.
[00:28:37]Â Jen:Â Yeah. And we will link to that the whole interview. I would love to read it, but I won't, I will spare you all, but it is well worth reading because of course his thoughts about the writing experience are complex as well. And he talks even more about his own children and envisioning his own children as he was writing it.
[00:28:51]Â And yeah, that's great. All right, well, let's move on to a quotation to discuss. Ashley, which quotation do you want to share?
[00:29:02]Â Ashley:Â I think I'm gonna go with something...
[00:29:05]Â Jen:Â Jen mentioned earlier when we started seeing at the end... First of all, I mean we could do a full analysis of how jim evolves as a character over the course of the novel and the ways that he becomes more and more empowered through his journey to take action, and his ability to take action and agency like really shifts him as a person and also highlights how, again, the whole system is only is only by keeping one like all these like horrible ways of like keeping one group down are the only reason that the system can exist because having the agency to stand up means the whole thing falls apart.
[00:29:44]Â Ashley:Â But anyway, I think we see at the end how part of how he has come to that place where he has more agency has to do with not just his language, but his education of himself. So I just wanted to use this particular quote, and I think we see this commentary, this theme, throughout the book..
[00:30:00]Â 'I read and read, but what I needed was to write. I needed that pencil. I could not keep track of my thoughts. I could not follow my own reasoning after a while. This was perhaps because I couldn't stop reading long enough to make space in my head. I was like a man who had not eaten for a season and then engorged himself until sick.
[00:30:20]Â And my books, once read, were not what I wanted, not what I needed. With my pencil,' and this I skipped a little bit, 'with my pencil I wrote myself into being. I wrote myself to here.' And I think that the symbolism of the pencil comes up throughout. Of course, young George loses his life over the pencil and we see the sacrifice that he made in order to get that pencil to James.
[00:30:42]Â And yet I think that it is so powerful to think about how it's not just through the reading, and I think there's all sorts of stuff in the book about the power of reading. But then, it's not just through the reading, but it's the being able to tell your own story is what, again, I, I think goes on to show how he becomes an agent for change, an agent for fighting, that he is able to channel the rage, the activism, like all of that.
[00:31:14]Â That he's able to channel that because of his ability to move from being able to read to being able to tell his own story. And so, yeah, I chose that one, but I think there are so many throughout the book that speak to that, but I felt like that was a really powerful component of the novel.
[00:31:31]Â Jen:Â Yeah. I think that mirrors the process, and I keep switching back and forth when I'm talking about him, but I think there is a definite arc of him starting as Jim and ending as James. And I'm, I don't think there's a moment where it switches, but I think that him writing his story. is writing into that ownership and that choice of his own name, and I think that's so powerful as well to watch.
[00:31:54]Â Just, there's so many great details in this novel that I think Everett builds in, and I will say I didn't pick up on all of them quite as distinctly in the audio as I did the print, so I am glad that I chose to read both formats because I think there's some things you almost have to, or I almost have to slow down to process on the page, which I'm just not able to do on audio as much.
[00:32:19]Â Ashley:Â Yeah. And I think I did wind up doing audio both times. I fully intended to read the print the second time, but I had theSo I just went that route a second time, but I will say that the second listening experience was also really powerful because again, such a nuanced work. So I would, again, I foresee that I will reread, I mean, this is one I would revisit many times. So I feel like I will revisit the print as well. And I think that's right, Jen, that there are things you can't see through the listening as clearly.
[00:32:49]Â But I also think having experienced it twice now, the second time I saw, like... Like with the reading and the pencil, like, I became more aware of those threads throughout, whereas I might have noticed particular scenes, I did not see as clearly the first time, all the very intentional continuity from the beginning to the end that I think is really powerful. What about you, Jen? What quote did you want to share?
[00:33:13]Â Jen:Â I had a lot of those about the reading and the writing as well, but I'm going to pick one that is dealing with a different issue. So this happens after Jim helps Sammy escape. momentarily from the plantation. And Sammy says, 'I know what it means. We're slaves. We're not anywhere. Free person. He can be where he wants to be.
[00:33:32]Â The only place we can ever be is in slavery.' And I think that's so powerful. Even as I was reading the publisher's synopsis where it's talking about finding their way to freedom, as if that's a place, as if when you hit this magical place in the North or, you know, their whole journey, they're so close to places that are designated as free.
[00:33:52]Â free places, but we know that even when they go there, they are not truly free. They're still imperiled by the identity that they've been given by their society. And so I thought that was such a great articulation of that concept that the system, yeah, there are places that are supposedly if you get there, you're okay.
[00:34:13]Â But we know that because the whole system is still in place, That freedom can be taken from them just as quickly as they earned it. And I thought that was really interesting to contemplate.
[00:34:25]Â Ashley:Â Yes, absolutely. I thought I mean, again, we could examine each character he encounters and what he learns from those experiences, but I think everything about Sammy was such a powerful section. And, again, this questioning of what's the right choice, yes, it was the right choice for him to help her escape, but then she died.
[00:34:46]Â And I think it's heartbreaking and it also is just so true that the peril that the enslaved community must face in order to have any chance of improvement is exactly what Sammy faces with the river and that that is a potential outcome. And I, so I just felt, and I think that whole discussion between him and Norman after and like, you know, was that the right thing?
[00:35:13]Â And him saying like, she was already dead, you know? But I thought all of that was just so well done. But absolutely this questioning of geography and this idea, and I think again, I mean, I'm going to generalize here, but I do think there is this, even in our telling of the history of slavery, there is this idea that the people in the North were like doing the quote unquote right thing, that the white people in the North were somehow above, morally above what was happening in the South, when the reality is that this larger structure was absolutely entrenched in all parts.
[00:35:51]Â That, again, when we're looking at these shades of morality, when all of them are keeping a group of people down, then those shades just don't matter. And that all they're doing is upholding the structure by helping people feel good about themselves because they're not as bad as Hopkins, for example. And I think, like, I just feel like that is just uncovered over and over again.
[00:36:12]Â I think that quote that you shared, Jen, is just one of the many examples of that. Like, absolutely. Like, There's just such injustice, and it's so pervasive, and any idea that people had that it wasn't that way in whatever place was a false idea.
[00:36:29]Â Jen:Â Well, and going back to Everett's comment in the interview of the distinction between freedom and rights, and that if your rights depend on where you are, you don't actually have them. And yeah, so I think that coming back to that idea that they're not inherent, that it's all geographically driven is mind boggling.
[00:36:53]Â Yeah.
[00:36:55]Â All right. Ashley, what is a pairing that you would like to recommend?
[00:37:02]Â Ashley:Â I am going to go with Pat Barker's The Silence of the Girls. This one, very different setting, but I think there are a lot of similarities. It's a retelling of The Iliad, so I think similarly to how James is commenting on The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, this one is commenting on the Iliad. And it focuses on Briseis, and she was the woman that is given to Achilles as a war prize, and so she's enslaved to him.
[00:37:33]Â Jen and I have discussed on the podcast Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles. I love that book. I love it. I love Achilles stories. I really like the idea of Achilles and Patroclus being together and this notion that, I mean, I thought all of that is great.
[00:37:52]Â Okay? So then reading this, it's like, oh yeah, that book is so brilliant, but also it's exactly what we were just talking about where like shades of what's quote unquote right and who are the quote moral people in a system that is horrific and inhumane. When you are Briseis or you are another enslaved woman, it does not make a difference who the quote unquote good guys are in this situation that is so broken, and I think so we see Briseis in this.
[00:38:26] We see that she was queen of one of the kingdoms. Her family was all royalty, and yet they are all killed or enslaved, and so she becomes Achilles' concubine. And all of a sudden, she gets caught in between, and again we see this in, Song of Achilles also, and in the original Iliad. But there's the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles that is huge and all based on, and again I think there's a lot of interesting commentary in this book, but I've seen it in others, of just like, the power of the men in charge, and how absurd that is.
[00:39:07]Â their perception of the world is and what matters and how they are playing these ridiculous games that are costing hundreds and thousands of lives. And again, this is real. I mean, this stuff happened. It happened in the past. It happens now. But I think that when we look at these structures, there is a reckoning in the telling from the perspectives of the people who are subjected to the whims of the people in charge.
[00:39:37]Â And so we absolutely see that here. So I, I thought it was brilliant. I did think it was absolutely heartbreaking. I thought it was a hard read for people who are sensitive because absolutely these things have happened. They do happen. The way that women are treated in war is awful. And so, you know, I would say that, that that is true in this book that I really felt, acutely pained by
[00:40:01]Â the, the situation that, not just Briseis, but she experiences some other just really, really, really horrific things. But I think it all is a telling of, we tell these fan... I mean, they really are fantasy, this, these fantastical stories of these war heroes. And we paint them as larger than life, when the reality is they are cruel.
[00:40:22] At best, they are unconcerned with the people below them. At worst, they are actually very willing to waste any of their lives for their own gain. I think it's really powerful. So again, that's Pat Barker's The Silence of the Girls. Different setting but very powerful commentary on rethinking these kind of foundational stories that are told and have been held on to throughout our history.
[00:40:50] Jen: Yeah, that's such a great recommendation. I read Silence of the Girls and The Song of Achilles and fairly, yeah, fairly close together. And I think that experience was so illuminating because of what you just said, that you're feeling all righteous about these characters who then you realize are just as corrupt and as much part of the system as the other people.
[00:41:12]Â Yeah. So it's such a fascinating, just revisionist experience. It's really interesting.
[00:41:18] Ashley: Yeah, yeah, and I think we see all the flaws of Achilles. I mean, part of what I loved in Song of Achilles is you see all his flaws, and you recognize how he's such, he's so human. He's so flawed, and because he's both powerful and human, he does these horrific things that cost all these people their lives.
[00:41:34]Â So you do see that, and I do think that you, as the reader, have to make sense of it. However, you see him in a very compassionate light, comparatively. And so, yeah, I think it is just so interesting to consider. these characters that have become iconic in our mythologies and in our stories and in our world.
[00:41:52]Â What about you, Jen? What is your pairing?
[00:41:55]Â Jen:Â So I am pairing this book with John Clinch's Finn, which is a little fuzzy. I read it back in 2007, so I don't have tons of detail, and some of the details that I remember are total spoilers, so I cannot share them here, but this is a retelling from the perspective of Huck's dad. And so I think it is not the literary accomplishment that James is.
[00:42:20]Â But I did think when I read it that taking... Again, he's a villain of the book. Absolutely. And so taking that angle and considering the story from his angle, and I enjoyed it because it does not apologize for what he did and his actions, and it does not sanitize it. It does not make him, Suddenly this guy with a heart of gold, but it does allow you to consider how he might've become the way he became.
[00:42:54] And so I thought that was really powerful. And there are some revelations about Huck that connect with an interesting way. And this is a spoiler territory, but I'll just say that it connects in an interesting way with the vision we see in James of the way that James himself sees Huck. So yeah, I would recommend it.
[00:43:14] I think again, it's not as deep a look at the society and its structures as James is, but it was really interesting and, and I thought it was really well done. Retelling. Clinch does a lot of these retellings. That's the only one of his I've read, but looking at his backlist, this is something that he, it is like a project for him.
[00:43:36]Â So, yeah.
[00:43:38]Â Ashley:Â Yeah, that's interesting. I hadn't heard of that and that would be, that's another interesting perspective in the book.
[00:43:44]Â Jen:Â And that would also work for a reading challenge. So you can add it to the list.
[00:43:48]Â Ashley:Â There you go. And that's true for mine as well.
[00:43:50]Â That, yeah, from a secondary character's perspective.
[00:43:53]Â Jen:Â All right. Well, it is time for our bookish heart. So though, I think we'll be predictable on this one. Ashley, how many bookish hearts do you give this?
[00:44:01]Â Ashley:Â A million? No. I mean, if we're on a five point scale, definitely five. I mean, like I said, it is for sure one of the most powerful reads I have read in years.
[00:44:10]Â What about you?
[00:44:10]Â Jen:Â Same easy. Yeah. More. Yes. More than five, all the stars, infinity stars, whatever. Yeah.
[00:44:17]Â Ashley:Â And really, I mean, I think if you're listening, you probably have already read, but if you haven't read it yet, it is one that got so much hype when it came out that I thought, I'm How can it be? How can it be that like a lot of times you see them everywhere and you're thinking, maybe it's not as much as the hype around it, but this is one where I was like, it wasn't hyped enough.
[00:44:37]Â Jen:Â Yes.
[00:44:37]Â Ashley:Â Like, I just think everyone needs to read it. It feels like a foundational read and just a really important consideration.
[00:44:45]Â Jen:Â It's part of the tournament of books this year and I'm anxious to see how it will do because sometimes the really popular books do get sort of judges' backlash, and I'm hoping that doesn't happen. I would love to see it take the whole thing because I just It's tough for me to think that anything else is going to hold up to it.
[00:44:58]Â So we'll see Yeah,
[00:45:03]Â Ashley:Â I did feel that the end was a little rushed. I didn't feel that this time.
[00:45:08]Â Jen:Â I didn't either.
[00:45:09]Â Ashley:Â Did you feel that? Okay, so I, I felt like, I was like, The end is not the
[00:45:14]Â Jen:Â Mm hmm.
[00:45:14]Â Ashley:Â this, the second time, the first time I was like, Whoa, I just, I think I didn't expect it to be the end.
[00:45:18]Â I did not expect it to be over. And then, this time I was like, the point is, I mean, there's that quote, I'm gonna misquote it so I won't do it, But where he's like, I am the angel of death. I am, you know, like he just lists the thing and I'm like, that's exactly it. The point is that he is now the embodiment of the reckoning that must come.
[00:45:38]Â And that's the point. And so the rest of what comes to pass after is like not that important. I mean, not that it's not important. I guess like, that's not the story that Percival Everett is trying to tell. So anyway, I felt like any critiques I had the first time, were even less this time because I was more like, Oh, I just didn't see it in this light because I was still on, you know, whatever, more superficial, as far as I could go in a first reading.
[00:46:01]Â And then the second read, I was like, Oh, this fits together even more than I thought it did.
[00:46:05]Â Jen:Â Yeah, I think part of mine was because I was expecting the whole part of the end with Tom and Huck and that, which is not my favorite part of the book, of Adventures of Huckberry Finn, but I was expecting that. And then to see it went in this entirely different direction and I think having, at the end, him declared that his name is James and nothing else, that he doesn't need a last name because that is buying into a part of a system again, that he is rejecting entirely.
[00:46:29]Â I think that journey is the story and yeah, I agree. It was perfect. But yes, I felt that the first time that was really funny... I felt that the first time through as well. And then the second time I was all on board.
[00:46:42]Â Ashley:Â Yeah, same.
[00:46:43]Â Jen:Â All right. Well, we will end our episode today with our unabridged favorites. Ashley, what is something that you want to share?
[00:46:51]Â Ashley:Â So I talked about this in our December mid. my newsletter, but it, since we're still kind of beginning of the year, I did a vision board with my kids and I did this related to a class project. Okay. So it's the kind of thing I might be a little bit, a little more than a little bit skeptical about as a family activity, but I was interested in doing something.
[00:47:14]Â I needed to do some kind of quote unquote intervention, which doesn't mean like making big changes. It just meant like we were studying groups and the way that. doing something can, you know, alter any piece of how groups work. And so, I wound up doing the vision board, but I will say it took us like less than two hours total.
[00:47:32]Â We did some brainstorming beforehand. Our whole family participated. We each did these like drawings of our family, incorporating some of the brainstorming pieces that each person had come up with. We shared those, and then we did a little collage together, and it was super fun. And so I just wanted to mention that was a favorite for me, and even if you have some healthy skepticism about that kind of thing,
[00:47:52]Â but you are looking for something for yourself or for your family as you're looking toward the new year, it was really fun and I anticipate we might do it every year. So, that's mine. What about you, Jen?
[00:48:03]Â Jen:Â So I am trying to recommend everywhere I can the show Somebody Somewhere. It just ended a three season run and that is the end of the series. It is a very short show. It's half hour episodes. There aren't that many episodes per season, but it is up there with my favorite shows ever. It is created by Bridget Everett.
[00:48:25]Â Everett is a cabaret performer, and so she is a great singer. She's not, she's not like, someone that you would see on Broadway, but she's just a really good singer, and she's a comedian. So she wrote this show based on her upbringing in the Midwest on a farm, and it is tender and crass and funny and heartbreaking, and it starts... Season one,
[00:48:56]Â her sister Holly died of cancer several months before, and she is living in Holly's house. And she is working at a company scoring student essays for like a testing company. And her life is not good. And she is grieving. She does not have a good relationship with her still living sister. She doesn't really have any friends.
[00:49:20]Â And at the company, she meets this man named Joel, they went to high school together and she finds out that he always admired her. He wasn't really on her radar, and they become best friends. So along the way there are romances, and there are weddings, and there are sad, sad things that happen.
[00:49:42]Â But I would say the through line is the story of... Her name in the show is Sam, Sam and Joel's friendship. And it is. a beautiful thing and I just love it so much. So I will say not safe for work. Be careful if you have kids, you may not want to watch in front of them. Cause when I say crass, I mean really crass.
[00:50:03] It is all on there on the screen. But the other show I mentioned this elsewhere that it reminded me of is Fleabag and the way it can pull you from hilarious laughter to like broken down sobbing in the space of a half hour episode. But it is different from Fleabag because it is more... More realistic. It just feels like a really day to day look.
[00:50:26]Â I would not say that there's a strong plot. It's just about these people's lives. Anyway, it's beautiful. Sorry, I'll stop rambling, but that is somebody somewhere, and I just love it so much. It is on Max, so if you don't have Max, that could be a problem, but it's worth subscribing just to watch it. You can get through it really fast, so yeah, it
[00:50:43]Â Ashley:Â You know I loved Fleabag. In fact, I felt a little teary just when you mentioned it.
[00:50:47]Â So, I love that one.
[00:50:48]Â Jen:Â Well, you would love this one just as much. You should totally watch it.
[00:50:51]Â Ashley:Â I know I might have to do a one month subscription or whatever. Yep.
[00:50:54]Â Jen:Â All right, everyone. Well, thank you so much for listening to our episode about James. We would love to hear your thoughts.
[00:50:59]Â and as always, thank you for your support.
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