The Good Lord Bird in Around the World in 80 Books

Jun 17, 2013 Julie Griffin rated it it was amazing

Shelves: first-reads

Many of the major characters in The Good Lord Bird are not who they appear to be, which is fitting for a novel about one of the most complicated figures in American history, John Brown. McBride, author of the lovely Color Of Water which drew deep and layered pictures of his parents and himself, does the same with the fictional characters in his latest novel. Henry, a young slave who lost his mother and watches his barber father being murdered before his eyes after an encounter with the abolition Many of the major characters in The Good Lord Bird are not who they appear to be, which is fitting for a novel about one of the most complicated figures in American history, John Brown. McBride, author of the lovely Color Of Water which drew deep and layered pictures of his parents and himself, does the same with the fictional characters in his latest novel. Henry, a young slave who lost his mother and watches his barber father being murdered before his eyes after an encounter with the abolitionists and pro-slavery forces that turned Missouri and Kansas into bloody war zones in the years before the civil war, is mistaken by John Brown for a girl, because of his small size and curly hair. He is kidnapped by the old man and joins the anti-slavery movement by default, continuing on with the Brown army because he does not know what else to do. Throughout the book, Henry becomes Henrietta, or Little Onion, and observes the events leading up to the infamous attack on Harper's Ferry that failed on all levels but in the process helped raise support for the abolition movement. He learns to behave like a girl, learns to read, shoot, hunt, and live by his wits. He raids, ends up in a brothel for a while, falls in love. Figures from history, including Jeb Stuart and Robert E. Lee, pop up, and most memorabe is an encounter Onion has with Harriet Tubman. McBride clearly admires the complicated figure of Brown, who massacred those who did not agree with him mercilessly and shamelessly while advocating freedom for the slaves, because he acknowledges he is "deeply grateful to all those who, over the years, have kept the memory of John Brown alive." But he does not shy away from showing the dark side--the inability to see the truth, intolerance, and clearly failing to take into account how the slaves themselves might feel about what he was doing or how he was going about it. Through the eyes of Little Onion, we travel with Brown through the prairies of terrorism in Kansas to the streets of Boston to meet with a ridiculous, self-indulgent Frederick Douglass, we watch Little Onion begin to understand the importance of the man he has ended up with and the kind of person he, or she, wants to become. Like Brown himself, Onion is complicated, never doubting himself as a man while being treated as a woman by most, and reviled by those who see through his ruse and deem him a sissy. Why did McBride decide to hide his man as a woman throughout the book? Women also have their roles as the bottom rungs of the ladder, and Onion is kept down even further as first a black, then a woman, then a possible "sissy" and through this we get an even deeper perspective into being dispossessed, and how different a perception can be from an internal soul. As we follow Onion to Harper's Ferry, we know how the story will end and it is hard to read the defeat from the boy's place in history. The story of John Brown was interesting to read again in the wake of the fiftieth anniversary of the bombing deaths of four little girls in the Birmingham church and the recent decisions about the Voting Rights Act and some of the reactions to that. It is also interesting to view this tale through the lens of America which has suffered acts of terrorism---when is violence right? when is it morally defensible to take another's life for disagreeing with our own, or in another perspective, to save the life of another? John Brown, in the end, was the historical equivalent of abortion clinic bombers and jihad seekers, and because our narrator, Onion, is a young boy, he does not provide those answers for us. All he can do is report what he lived through, both the good and the bad. In the end, Onion tells us, "He (John Brown) believed God was on his side. Everybody got God on their side in a war. Problem is, God ain't tellin' nobody who he's for." ...more

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Jan 30, 2021 Erica rated it really liked it

Shelves: american-history

Heard a few interviews with Ethan Hawke about this book's adaptation to a miniseries and of course had to read the book first. It was entertaining and enlightening. A but frustrating at times, and the first third is rough because there is so much crazy Christian moralizing by John Brown. (The second third, mostly devoid of Brown, is actually the best part of the book, oddly!) I'm glad that McBride captured the insanity of Brown, and his selfless courage. But I'm left still wondering why Onion ne ...more

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