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A review by ladylizardxvii
A People's History of Heaven by Mathangi Subramanian
5.0
This book is not perfect, but then, neither is life, which is what A People's History of Heaven perfectly depicts. This book was beautiful, moving and read like poetry. I thought the first person plural perspective was a brilliant choice: the reader is effortlessly placed right in the middle of all these stories, friend groups and families.
The characters were so well depicted and developed. We get to know Heaven because we get to know the characters so well; this is a people's history, after all. This isn't the 'official' history or the winners' history, this is the true history, an accurate representation of lives.
The story does jump around quite a bit chronologically without very good cues. While this is jarring in some places, I do think it works in a way because the memories and real time events all jumbled up do seem life-like. All these moments together are what make the characters themselves and what lead them to protesting the bulldozers. I do wish that particular thread (the bulldozers in real time) had been a little stronger throughout, but all in all I loved this book and had trouble putting it down.
The characters were so well depicted and developed. We get to know Heaven because we get to know the characters so well; this is a people's history, after all. This isn't the 'official' history or the winners' history, this is the true history, an accurate representation of lives.
The story does jump around quite a bit chronologically without very good cues. While this is jarring in some places, I do think it works in a way because the memories and real time events all jumbled up do seem life-like. All these moments together are what make the characters themselves and what lead them to protesting the bulldozers. I do wish that particular thread (the bulldozers in real time) had been a little stronger throughout, but all in all I loved this book and had trouble putting it down.