The Underground Railroad in Shadow Lounge Readathon Group

Apr 06, 2017 Juli rated it it was ok

I wanted to love this book badly.

Re-imagining The Underground Railroad as an actual railroad sounded so perfect. I adored the concept and couldn't wait to read this book. I waited months for my library copy and everyone I came across meanwhile praised this book highly. When it was finally in my hands, it became clear, within the first few pages, it was not what I had hoped for. The beginning was extremely slow - which I would've understood if it aided in character development, but it didn't. Th I wanted to love this book badly.

Re-imagining The Underground Railroad as an actual railroad sounded so perfect. I adored the concept and couldn't wait to read this book. I waited months for my library copy and everyone I came across meanwhile praised this book highly. When it was finally in my hands, it became clear, within the first few pages, it was not what I had hoped for. The beginning was extremely slow - which I would've understood if it aided in character development, but it didn't. The story did pick up a little once the main protagonist, Cora, was on the run. And, let me tell you, I was super excited at that point because it meant the underground railroad was about to be introduced - the true main protagonist in my opinion.

To my surprise, that didn't happen. In fact, reading on, I found myself continuously wishing for more descriptions and stories about the railroad. How was it built? What was the tunnel system like? Where did the train engines come from? How did you become a conductor? How did they choose the stations? Who came up with the idea of digging tunnels for an underground railroad in the first place? Really none of these questions were answered in the book.

Did I miss the point of the book? I must have. Because it did describe the turmoils of slave life and being on the run beautifully, so I think the book has great potential. But it is no Kindred (by Octavia Bulter)- which just blew me away when I read it the first time and gave me my first insight into slavery in the US. Indeed, I kept waiting for Cora's story to tug at my heart strings the way Kindred did but it just didn't happen - and objectively speaking it should've, her story was terrifying, absolutely gruesome, and memorable. On top of it, she was an extremely courageous protagonist giving us all the makings of a touching novel. I think if the author would've found an even balance between Cora's journey and the story of the underground railroad, Cora's emotional and physical turmoil and the cruelties she endured would've stood out more and would've allowed me to form some emotional attachment to her. Instead, I found myself getting more and more distant from her as I read on because one thing after another happened making them all blend together and thus losing some of the punch.

When I made it to the final chapter, I thought, this will be the redeeming factor - she was about to do something so brave even though it was incredibly scary. Instead, for some reason the last leg of her journey was just sort of mentioned in passing, which is a completely missed opportunity in my opinion - here, the author could've woven in so many facts about his underground railroad, maybe given Cora visions of the labor it took to built the tunnels or how people procured box cars and train engines.

Overall, I really wish Colson Whitehead would've had spent more time on the trains and story of the railroad and less on side stories of some of the characters - which at the very most were interesting but not necessary for the novel to progress. Or maybe I should've had fewer expectations for the book. I don't know - either way though, I, very sadly, did not enjoy the book the way I had predicted.

See my blog (spoilers possible!) here: https://ichleseblog.wordpress.com/201... ...more

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