784. Beloved

Beloved
Toni Morrison
1987
Around 325 pages

124 was spiteful.

That has to be one of the best opening lines in literature. This is definitely my favorite Toni Morrison novel, and fulfills all the potential promised in her earlier works. We are on a great run of novels lately.

Beloved centers on Sethe, a formerly enslaved woman, and her 18-year-old daughter, Denver, who live at 124 Bluestone Road. The site has been haunted for years by what the family believes is the ghost of Sethe's eldest daughter. Sethe's sons, Howard and Buglar, ran away from home by the age of 13, which she believes was due to the ghost. After Paul D, who was enslaved at the same plantation as Sethe, forces out the spirit, a young woman named Beloved shows up. 

I love that this is essentially a horror novel, seamlessly blending the hell that is American history with the supernatural. I loved experiencing Sethe and Beloved's increasingly twisted relationship, and Morrison, as always, came up with plenty of disturbing reveals that made for a riveting reading experience.

Just flawless, from start to finish.

RATING: *****

Interesting Facts:

Won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Made in a 1998 film starring Oprah Winfrey.

UP NEXT: The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster