Tayari's Blog: It's Review Season II: The AJC

Young writer's talent glows amid the tragedy

By VALERIE BOYD
For the Journal-Constitution

Tayari Jones' new novel, "The Untelling," fulfills the promise of
her 2002 debut, "Leaving Atlanta," and then some.

Born and raised in Atlanta, the Spelman College graduate used her
impressive first novel to explore one of the most hateful periods in
the recent history of the City Too Busy to Hate. Set in the late 1970s
and early '80s, "Leaving Atlanta" chronicles the Atlanta child murders
from the distinct perspectives of three black fifth-graders who lose
friends, and their innocence, to the heinous killing spree.

Jones was an Atlanta grade-schooler during that grim time, and she
mines her memories to moving effect. "This strongly grounded tale hums
with the rhythms of schoolyard life," Publishers Weekly opined, "and
proves Jones to be a powerful storyteller."

With "The Untelling," Jones — now a professor at the University of
Illinois — reveals herself as one of the most important writers of her
generation, able to stand confidently alongside such heralded young
black authors as Edwidge Danticat, Colson Whitehead and ZZ Packer.

While her first novel had at its center an epic tragedy, the new
novel begins with a tiny tragedy, epic only to its survivors. In a
startling prologue, a family of five sets out on a drive in their
burgundy Buick on the Saturday before Easter 1978. They are heading to
a spring recital at a YWCA on Atlanta's west side, hauling an
extravagant three-layer red velvet cake for the reception.

All ambitiously christened by their mother, Hermione is nearly 15,
Ariadne is 10 and their baby sister is 6 months old. With "too much
name for a baby," narrator Ariadne relates, "Genevieve was a beautiful
thing, all curves and folds of flesh, smelling of rose water and
drool."

Amid a family discussion about the legend of the dogwood tree — the
girls have heard that it was used to make the cross of Jesus, "and now
the tree is so shamed that it grows all little and hunched up" — an
accident occurs that changes everything.

"I ruined the cake when our car crumpled against the bark of a
hundred-year-old magnolia," Ariadne remembers:
I hugged it to me, grinding the white icing and red meat of the
cake into the bib of my jumper. When the car stopped moving, I didn't
look up right away. I stared at my lap and the mess I'd made, dark red
like watermelon, busted and overripe. Then, Mama wailed and Genevieve
stayed quiet. Daddy barked, "Wait!" and Hermione cursed quietly,
enunciating each filthy word while I stuffed a handful of cake into my
mouth, choking on its buttery sweetness.

The accident's survivors — Ariadne, Hermione and their mother,
Eloise — are marked by this moment like dogwood petals, which are said
to bear the mythic blood of Jesus in their little red spots.

Fifteen years later, 25-year-old Aria (a nickname she claims on the
day of the accident) still struggles with her family's sad legacy,
even as she attempts to build a normal life. A literacy worker who
lives in the West End in "a fixer-upper that hasn't been fixed up
yet," Aria has a secret that she takes nearly half the novel to reveal
to her good-guy boyfriend, Dwayne: She believes she's pregnant.

The truth turns out to be much more complicated, and it sends Aria
on a spiraling journey of self-discovery. Throughout, she grapples
with questions of guilt and guile, fault and forgiveness,
responsibility and reconciliation.

Metro Atlantans will recognize the city landmarks that pepper Jones'
novel — the accident occurs near Mosley Park; Aria recalls her college
days at Spelman; Dwayne lives in a cookie-cutter apartment on Windy
Hill Road — and give it a strong sense of place. As with her previous
book, Atlanta is more than a setting; it becomes almost a living,
breathing character, alternately protecting Aria's secrets and
exposing her lies.

The qualities that many readers loved about "Leaving Atlanta" —
Jones' lyrical language, imaginative storytelling and mastery at
capturing the voice of a child — are all on full display in "The
Untelling." But this novel is about a personal quest, not a communal
one. Compared with "Leaving Atlanta," it is a smaller, quieter story.
Yet, in the hands of this gifted young writer, it is no less poignant
or powerful.

Valerie Boyd, author of "Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora
Neale Hurston," is a journalism professor at the University of
Georgia.