Chantal James

Representation: Black characters
Trigger warnings: Hurricanes, disappearance of an adoptive mother, adoption
Score: Four points out of ten.
This review can also be found on The StoryGraph.

Man, I was disappointed. A few months ago I saw this new book arrive at one of the two libraries I visit but I put it off for a while to read other novels (some of which I enjoyed. However, I didn't enjoy some other ones.) Afterwards, I finally stopped delaying, picked it up and read it. When I finished, the story underwhelmed me to the point where I didn't want to reread it. It starts with the main character Ham whose last name I don't know living alone in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina hits (here's the catch: I don't know why my library put this one in the historical genre when it's set in the early 21st century. Why? It also has a touch of fantasy but I can understand the history takes up most of the novel. If I were a librarian I wouldn't put it in historical, instead I'd put it in fantasy.) Only a few pages in, the flaws surface: there is an inconsistent POV as it keeps disjointedly switching from the 3rd POV omniscient narrator, the spirit, to the 1st POV of the protagonist, Ham. It's not an enjoyable reading experience and I had to struggle to finish it off, otherwise I would've given it a DNF. At least it's barely over 200 pages making it a quick and snappy read. I couldn't connect or relate to the characters either which is a pattern I'm seeing in a concerning amount of novels I read. In the end Ham becomes a father, somehow frees himself from the spirit (that was Ham's goal throughout the narrative) concluding it on a high note.… (more)

** spoiler alert ** Fiction is fiction, and we're supposed to be able to read it as that, but I can't always do so. That's the reason I stay away from things like "psychological thrillers," in which I'm apt to see a character pushed to the point of maximum anxiety and vulnerability. Chantal James' None But the Righteous isn't a psychological thriller. It's a dreamy, complex narrative of Ham, a young man who's never had a real home and who finds himself drifting after Hurricane Katrina. He wears a necklace with a small fragment of a saint's bone; it's the saint's way of remaining in this world, and at times the saint can guide Ham's thoughts or actions. So far, so good. Interesting premise, lots of possibilities...

Here's where the spoiler part comes in. Over the course of his wanderings, Ham stays with Deborah, a young woman, and her family. They have sex, consensually, Ham continues in his wanderings and discovers two months later that he's about to become a father. His response, after a second stay with Deborah and her family, is to wander yet again, joining a group of migrant workers after promising he'll save his earning to support the baby. Not necessarily ideal parenting, but the point of fiction isn't to depict ideals—it's to tell believable stories that let readers explore human possibilities.

Ham eventually returns to Deborah, with many baby gifts, then asks permission to take the baby for the day to the city where he was born as a sort of "baptism." A childhood friend, Wally, is with him at this point. And the novel ends as they reach their destination and Ham toys with the idea of whether or not he'll return the baby to its mother and her family. And I can't read this part of the story as anything other than terrifying. What happens to the baby? How long will it be until she returns home? What kind of childcare skills does Ham have? What will happen to the mother and her family while the baby is (potentially) missing?

Basically, the novel ends on a horrific point of ambiguity that I can't embrace as mere fiction.

I received a free electronic review cpy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley; the opinions are my own.… (more)