BookDragon Blog

I have old emails in my inbox from Jabari Asim, when he used to be a books editor at The Washington Post. I did a couple of book reviews for him, and pitched a few more … full disclosure: he was always very nice, very easy to work with, and he barely changed a word. He even sent proofed copy back before publication! Now I get to write about him here because in just a couple of weeks, Asim makes his fiction debut – he’s already been lauded for his nonfiction titles, The N Word and What Obama Means … For Our Culture, Our Politics, as well as a number of kiddie books.

Made up of 18 interconnected stories (although the back cover and accompanying PR letter both say 16 – I counted multiple times to make sure this wasn’t some new math!),  A Taste of Honey, follows the residents of a fictional town somewhere in the Midwest, not unlike a Chicago suburb. It begins and ends with tragic, racially-motivated deaths: first the murder in the summer of ’67 of “the short, scary-looking blind man who ran the candy store on Vandeventer” in the opening story, “I’d Rather Go Blind,” and concludes with the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. which affects the final three stories.

But lest you dismiss this as a depressing, sad collection, be assured it’s not. In spite of the tumultuous racial divide of the late 1960s, Asim’s Gateway City residents both struggle and celebrate their challenging, changing lives. The Jones family is raising three strong sons, the oldest in love for the first time and thinking about faraway Harvard, the middle child boasting bravery but suddenly afraid of zombies, and the youngest who just might be the wisest of all.

Uncle Orville, who was a top graduate at Tuskegee, didn’t go on to win the Nobel Prize as Big Mama (the Jones boys’ grandmother) expected, but came home to teach high school chemistry at a “white school way out in the suburbs.” At least he tutors the neighborhood genius, who just wants to ask if Orville is his missing father.

Next door to the Jones lives the honey-voiced Rose who wants nothing more than to sing to God’s glory, but her abusive husband has no patience for her dulcet praises. When he suddenly disappears, and Gabriel appears – he isn’t named after the avenging angel for nothing! – Rose might finally be able to breathe freely again.

The ugly shadow of violent racism is never far, especially in the guise of the local white cop, an evil man beyond tolerance. But life goes on while the youth are organizing and protesting the inequity all around them. Change is definitely coming, even while something that should be so terrible as revenge can produce a guilty but grateful sigh of relief. In spite of its slimness, Asim’s new volume is dense with lingering glimpses into real lives … and ultimately (the audacity of) real hope.

Readers: Adult

Published: 2010