{"id":1670,"date":"2021-06-17T17:23:29","date_gmt":"2021-06-17T17:23:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/?p=1670"},"modified":"2021-06-17T17:24:40","modified_gmt":"2021-06-17T17:24:40","slug":"the-water-dancer-by-ta-nehisi-coates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/2021\/06\/17\/the-water-dancer-by-ta-nehisi-coates\/","title":{"rendered":"The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates"},"content":{"rendered":"

c.2019, One World\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong>
\n$28.00 \/ $37.00 Canada\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong>
\n416 pages<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Terri Schlichenmeyer
\nThe Truth Contributor<\/p>\n

From September, 2019<\/em><\/p>\n

You can\u2019t breathe.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s really no describing the panic when that happens. Your ribs struggle to rise, your chest feels like it\u2019s being stomped, you\u2019re on fire, and your brain screams. Your arms flail. Your hands grasp at nothing, and then \u2013 ahhhhh, you gasp. And in the new novel, The Water Dancer<\/em> by Ta-Nehisi Coates<\/strong>, nothing\u2019s better than the first breath of freedom\u2019s air.<\/p>\n

Hiram was drowning.<\/p>\n

One minute, he was in the carriage and the next, he and the horse were struggling in the water. Oddly, though, the lack of breath, seeing his half-brother float away, tasting mud on the riverbanks, none of that bothered him. He thought he saw his mother dancing on the bridge, but she was sold away years ago; the water felt familiar but everything did, all the time. Hi grew up knowing he had a gift that allowed him to see his ancestors and to remember everything, and this drowning was one of those things.<\/p>\n

He woke up in a bed wearing fresh clothes that belonged to his half-brother, Maynard. Hi\u2019s father \u2013 the man who owned him \u2013 was weeping because Maynard was lost, and Hi realized then that whatever relationship he\u2019d had with his white father was over.<\/p>\n

His life at the great house on Virginia\u2019s Lockless Plantation, over. That his father looked the other way when Hiram showed interest in Sophia, a housegirl Hi delivered every weekend to his father\u2019s brother for reasons Hi preferred not to think about\u2026 done<\/em>. His whole life was spent as a Tasker for people who owned him, toiling for Quality folk and thinking that if he did the right things, he\u2019d be rewarded with some sort of equality or freedom or\u2026.<\/p>\n

Or he\u2019d been fooling himself.<\/p>\n

He\u2019d never be equal to the Quality. He\u2019d never love who he wanted to love, or know for certain that he\u2019d never be sold Natchez-way. And that meant just one thing.<\/p>\n

It was time to run.<\/p>\n

Hunched over. That\u2019s what you\u2019ll be with The Water Dancer<\/em>: hunched over as you read, to protect your heart from this story and because the anticipation of what\u2019s to come is too much to handle if you\u2019re upright.<\/p>\n

Using a little magic, the full meaning of which may not become totally clear until nearly the end of this tale, author Ta-Nehisi Coates captivates readers with language rich and reminiscent of poetry or song. The beauty of those words is calming-not-calming, like lying on a fresh-smelling, springy bed of moss on the edge of quiet woods, waiting to hear heavy footsteps you know are coming. Cue the ominous music, but don\u2019t think that this is a horror novel. No, it\u2019s more of an escape-novel-thriller-love-story-drama-history with a cast of characters that couldn\u2019t seem more real.<\/p>\n

One of them, in fact, was<\/em> real so look for her and don\u2019t worry if the plot of this book doesn\u2019t make sense at first; it will soon enough. Just settle, let the words wash in, and The Water Dancer<\/em> will knock the breath out of you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

c.2019, One World\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 $28.00 \/ $37.00 Canada\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 416 pages By Terri Schlichenmeyer The Truth Contributor From September, 2019 You can\u2019t breathe. There\u2019s really no describing the panic when that happens. Your ribs struggle to rise, your chest feels like it\u2019s being stomped, you\u2019re on fire, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1671,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[20],"class_list":["post-1670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book_review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1670"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1670\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1672,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1670\/revisions\/1672"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1670"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=1670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}