![]() A lot of people said, ‘This could have been shorter.’ But there’s no way you can go over 270 years of history and keep it short.” Although I love this book, I felt like it had to be that long. “I’m never writing another 800-page book again. With a deft hand, Jeffers explores these historical events while reflecting on social issues like childhood sexual abuse and colorism, all while making sure that the relationships in the book are the beating heart of the narrative - though the author says she’s never writing another epic again. Jeffers’ saga of this Black family spans from the colonization inflicted upon the Mvskoke (Creek) tribe to the horrors of slavery and the indignities of Jim Crow. It’s about Ailey’s ancestors and her people. “There were maybe a thousand people when my mother was growing up.”īut the book is about things that are bigger than Ailey, Chicasetta, or the entire state of Georgia. “My mother taught Alice Walker - that’s how teeny, tiny that town is,” Jeffers explains. ![]() Although the book is not based on Jeffers’ life, the fictional town Chicasetta was inspired by her mother’s hometown of Eatonton, in central Georgia, where writer Alice Walker is from. Du Bois revolves around Ailey Pearl Garfield, a Black girl raised in the North but rooted in her mother’s small hometown of Chicasetta, Georgia. Recently selected by Oprah Winfrey for her book club, The Love Songs of W.E.B. ![]()
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