The Warmth of Other Suns My Rating: 3.7
Wilkerson presents a definitive and dramatic account of one of the great untold stories of American history: the Great Migration of six million Black citizens who fled the South for the North and West in search of a better life, from World War I to 1970.
Wilkerson tells this interwoven story through the lives of three protagonists: Ida Mae Gladney, a sharecropper’s wife, who in 1937 fled Mississippi for Chicago; sharp and quick-tempered George Starling, who in 1945 fled Florida for Harlem, and Robert Foster, a surgeon who left Louisiana in 1953 in hopes of making it in California.
Wilkerson captures their first treacherous cross-country journeys by car and train and their new lives in colonies in the New World. This captures an “unrecognized immigration” within our own land.
While I respect the significance of this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and acknowledge the importance of the story it tells, I found the execution lacking in key areas.
Although the core story is powerful and deeply important, the book would have benefited greatly from stronger editing. It wandered into too many side storylines, many of which pulled focus away from the three main characters — characters I wanted to know more deeply. Instead of rich character development, the narrative often got bogged down in excessive backstory, repetition, and meandering detours.
At several points, I found myself slipping into “skim mode,” wishing the story had been told with more conciseness and clarity.
There's no doubt that the events portrayed are horrific and should never be forgotten, but I believe that a more streamlined and focused approach could have made the novel even more impactful.
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