This book is arrestingly beautiful. It’s also brutal. In the words of Glennon Doyle Melton, from "Carry On, Warrior: Thoughts on Life Unarmed": “Life is brutal, but it’s also beautiful. Life is brutiful.” 

Jesmyn Ward’s latest novel is just that-- brutiful. It’s simultaneously a difficult and fast read; it oozes poetic language and magic realism. Each of the thirteen chapters reads like a short story within a larger narrative. 

Even though Let Us Descend is historical fiction and contains fantastical elements, it feels more real than most nonfiction narratives I’ve read about slavery in America. 

Annis is the child of an enslaved woman, whose mother descends from Africa, and her father is her “sire”-- the white man who owns her. His white children are her half-sisters. Annis’s mother teaches her from a young age that she, though born into slavery, is her own weapon. 

The spirits guiding Annis through rings of hell that mirror Dante’s inferno are both comforting and confusing to both the protagonist and the reader-- but maybe that’s the point. Annis’s path to survival is anything but clear, and it’s ultimately a journey she has to feel her way through on her own. 

Jesmyn Ward’s writing is one-of-a-kind, and the imagery and language presented here was often so poignant that I had to stop reading and just savor it (or allow myself to reflect on what happened for a period of time). When I first started reading, I’d read a chapter each night, then forcefully stop-- falling asleep while mulling over Annis’ fate and Ward’s language. This is a heavy novel, and it’s often hard to keep going. Though once I grew accustomed to this “brutiful” heaviness, I couldn’t put it down. 

As soon as I finished "Let Us Descend," I felt compelled to read it again-- to allow myself to savor the magically painted words once more. That said, many of the hardships presented here are tough to read once, let alone a second time. If it’s this hard to read it, what was it like for Ward to write it? I wonder if writing such a visceral novel is traumatic, cathartic, or both. And most importantly, how is it possible that millions of enslaved people experienced such daily abuse and somehow survived? Ward’s novel will make your heart ache for fictional Annis and the other (fictional) brave, captured people in her world, but it will also give you new, unflinching insight into the very real people and the very real atrocities they experienced at the hands of their captors. 

The fact that much of the novel takes place in and around New Orleans, made it hit closer to home for me. I’ve visited slave auction landmarks in the French Quarter and sugarcane plantations outside of the city, where I learned about the grueling harvests in the killer cane fields. The scenes Ward paints here allowed those inhumane, gruesome realities to come to life for me. As Ward so brutifully writes, “No life here, no soft touch but in recollection, recollection that floats high above the dreamers, churning with sorrow, with remembrance. It deepens in the quiet.” 

If I could, I would give this book 6 stars out of 5. This book is like none other, and everyone should read it. 

Beautifully written, just like Ward’s other novels. It didn’t grab me quite the same way, though— maybe because it covers a much longer timeframe than her other works? Or because the subject matter is so rough? Or because I read it so fast? Either way, I’ll definitely be rereading at some point— Ward’s writing is absolutely incredible and her stories stay with you. Amazing! 

this story was so poetically written, it was beautiful to read.
it wasn’t too long, the perfect time to tell the story as needed without dragging on.
annis’ story is just so tragic and you think it can’t get worse but it continues to do so.
although difficult this was a really important read; exploring a young woman’s perseverance through loss, grief and insurmountable odds, with magical realism interwoven through the pages to provide hope and guidance.

Jesmyn Ward is a national treasure, and so is this book.

Let Us Descend is a portrait of one woman’s descent into not just any Hell, but a Hell of [white] man’s own creation. During her descent, Annis contends with the spirits that vie for her devotion, yet who seem to let her and her people down at every turn, subjecting her to the cruel whims of white demons.

I’m not sure there’s much I can say about this book other than it should be on EVERYONE’S list. It captures the beauty of Black love and family, the wretched and calculated suffering that white people have inflicted upon our people, and the complicated nature of “freedom” that refugee, formerly enslaved Black folks living on the fringes (e.g., maroons) experienced. And it places pressure on the idea of Black resilience—we should not need to be resilient, to continually give ourselves to a world that seeks our destruction.

For my Black siblings, I do want to issue a word of caution, since this is an extremely heavy book that weighed on my spirit quite a bit as I read. I love Ward’s writing because she is SO remarkably talented—she is one of the best writers of our time—but I do space out my reads of her books because of how heavily they impact me.

So, tl;dr: please please please do yourself a favor and preorder+read this book.

Thank you so much to Scribner for the gifted ARC!