Jack: Signed Edition
Hardback Published on: 29/09/2020
Price: £18.99
Synopsis
Marilynne Robinson, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the American National Humanities Medal, returns to the world of Gilead with Jack, the final in one of the great works of contemporary American fiction.
Jack tells the story of John Ames Boughton, the loved and grieved-over prodigal son of a Presbyterian minister in Gilead, Iowa, a drunkard and a ne'er-do-well. In segregated St. Louis sometime after World War II, Jack falls in love with Della Miles, an African-American high school teacher, also a preacher's child, with a discriminating mind, a generous spirit and an independent will. Their fraught, beautiful story is one of Robinson's greatest achievements.
Publisher information
- Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
- ISBN: 9780349014685
- Number of pages: 320
- Dimensions: 222 x 138 mm
Customer Reviews
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Banned love in segregated America.
Down on his luck Jack (a white guy) falls for beautiful, black Della in St Louis at a time when such a union was illegal and dangerous. Jack's love is touc... READ MORE
Too smart by half
Marilynne Robinson's writing is excruciatingly detailed as she painstakingly atomises every minute detail of thought and feeling but in this love story of ... READ MORE
Beautifully Written
Jack is a beautifully written book and can be read as standalone. It is a tale of Jack and Della who meet and fall in love but can’t be together in 1950s s... READ MORE
It will take all from you before you can count what it has given you, that kind of love.
We are back in the world of Gilead but not in Gilead itself. Marilynne Robinsson presents us again with an unusual couple, the same way she did in Lila. ... READ MORE
A beautiful and important novel
With thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance review copy.
I was blown away by Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead when I first read it, and was eage... READ MORE
A thoughtful, impossible love story
This book is in essence a very thoughtful, empathetic and sensitive love story, but in post WW2 USA, love between a white man and a black woman could not ... READ MORE
Lyrical and beautifully written
Jack is the fourth in the Gilead series, and I really recommend reading them all to really appreciate the continuing story of the Boughton family. As with ... READ MORE
here is no doubt here that this is an author who masters language and the communication of human nature
With thanks to NetGalley #Jack #NetGalley
This is a lyrically written, wholly emotive love story, which I imagine adds to the previous three novels in the ... READ MORE
Fans of Marilynne Robinson will not be disappointed
My first Marilynne Robinson! I started my read with an awareness that this is an author with fans in high places including Barack Obama, with a list of lit... READ MORE
Hard going for a short read
I was intrigued to follow the relationship between Jack and Della, however this was the only thing that kept me going with this book. The book is made up m... READ MORE
Mixed-race love in post-war America
Marilynne Robinson’s prizewinning series of books based around the fictional town of Gilead have long been one of my favourites so I was thrilled to get th... READ MORE
Story only picked up in the last 50 pages or so
I really struggled with the writing style for most of the book & couldn’t follow who was talking/narrating
The story of Jack & Della’s relationship did ... READ MORE
Ok, but not the best of the series
I have really enjoyed the Gilead books, although all their themes are quite depressing, but I found this one very wordy, almost rambling at times and wish ... READ MORE
Return to Gilead
In 1634 a fleet of ships is heading to Amsterdam from the Dutch East Indies with a very special, very mysterious cargo alongside the usual spices on one of... READ MORE
Gets better as it goes
Not going to lie - I found this book hard-going.
It took me a good half of the book to really get into it. Jack and Della are the two central characters, ... READ MORE
Grace, love, youth and all that
"Jack" by Marilynne Robinson is the fourth instalment of the author's Gilead saga, the first, in order of writing rather than chronology, being "Gilead", f... READ MORE
Beyond dreary
I gave up at 10% as the writing was dreary, the conversation boring and the charatcers acted in a bizarre way with each other. I found out from other revie... READ MORE