Jocelyn Nicole Johnson

I didn’t understand this book structurally when I first began reading. The “My Monticello” part is a novella that follows 4 short stories. Not knowing this in advance made the beginning of the audiobook confusing. This would probably not have been a problem at all for print readers, and I got through it quickly.

The first of the stories is arguably the most brilliant part of the book. In “Control Negro”, narrated by Levar Burton in the audio version, an aging African American man show more recounts what happens when he plans to plot out the life of a black youth in a way that makes his position in the world a perfect parallel for a young white man in the same circumstances. If he controls all variables, will this young black man have the same life arc as his white counterpart?

The other stories are very good, but all the other parts of the book pale in comparison with the My Monticello section.

I can’t avoid the disclaimer: Yet another book set where I live. In central Virginia, although this time a hour west of Richmond, in and around Charlottesville. Most specifically, on the mountain that is topped by the estate created by Thomas’s Jefferson, Monticello. Additional disclosure: I have visited Monticello multiple times, most recently just 6 months ago.

Author Johnson’s imagination takes off from the day in 2017 when a young woman was killed by a white supremacist who intentionally drove his car into a group of protestors in Charlottesville. She layers on top of that electrical outages resulting from violent storms triggered by climate change. And in the midst of this chaos, the white supremacists take to the streets, terrorizing persons of color and others without economic means. A group of these persons escapes from the horrific conditions of the neighborhood, eventually settling at Monticello.

This story was beautifully written. I felt very much connected with the main character, a young African American woman, as well as her two boyfriends, one black, one white. And her grandmother and various people from her neighborhood. And the pacing (always so important to me) was excellent, moving forward toward a likely, but nevertheless uncertain, outcome.

High marks for conceptualization and execution, although the format seemed a bit contrived. I anticipate good things to come from Jocelyn Nicole Johnson. show less

This collection of stunning, shocking portrayals of mini and maxi aggressions against Black people is remarkable in its soaring imaginings. The first story, The Control Negro, sets the stage by having a Black professor as the distant observer of the treatment of his own son, until he becomes an active participant in the child's oppression, was included in America's Best Short Stories of 2018. The masterpiece is the title story, a shocking recounting of a dystopian takeover of show more Charlottesville, VA by violent white supremacists, as part of the collapse of American society and its electrical grid, where each individual community must resist or surrender to the conquerors. A group of neighbors flee to Jefferson's home museum, led by Da'Naisha Hemmings Love, a college student and a direct descendent of Sally Hemmings and Thomas Jefferson. They become a utopian family and a collective, but the threat of an attack remains constant amid the irony of living in Monticello, in the Big House, cultivating its historic gardens and outfitting themselves in t shirts from the gift shop. The menace is overwhelming, the reader can see what's coming and yearns to protect the small band of gallant survivors.

Quote: "I felt that knotted tie to Monticello, my bond by blood and water - as master and slave. My ancestors had conceived of this house and bloodied their hands to build and maintain it." show less

The novella of the collection was a fascinating portrait of an all too real future where the grid goes down, the police disband, and a white militia group decides to drive out the poor black residents in low income housing. "The men came at dusk blaring an operatic O say can you see. White heads rose up from dusty Jeeps and dark hair thrashed in a harsh new wind like tattered flags. OURS! the men shouted. Their rifles gleamed as if they’d only just been bought: a megastore militia." The show more story takes place near Charlottesville and the group manages to escape in an abandoned bus and drive to Monticello where as it turn out the author of the tale we are reading not only worked there but is actually related to Sally Hemings. The first person narrator, Da'Naisha Love, details the 19 days spent held up in the famous historical house as they prepare for the inevitable battle that will ensue.
Lines:
Later, after we’d gotten together in earnest, after the air had grown cold enough to draw frost from our words, Knox and I took a giddy selfie on the Lawn, our bodies angled close. I felt short, of course, nestled there in the pit of his arm. Knox smelled like castile soap and wood smoke, since it was finally cold enough that he’d begun to use the fireplace in his dorm. I remember I could feel him peering down at the crown of my head with such adoration, my hair pulled taut to a puff at my neck, a bind that he would undo that same night with trembling, reverent fingers. Posing there, I knew there was nothing so peculiar between us, between any one person and the next. But when we looked at the result, we had to pretend it wasn’t a jab, the way the flash could hardly contain us—it blew out Knox’s fine features and burned mine to pitch.

KJ skulked near the Jaunt, dragging his suitcase, a thin scar on his forehead arching like a second brow, giving his young face a look of near-constant wonder.

In the summers of my childhood, seemed like you could always hear the ice-cream truck down the road, its eerie carnival jingle, and the creepy pale driver who would trade hot quarters for something melty and sweet.

To me guns meant indiscriminate power, the risk of fatally misjudging someone else’s worth.

She looked uninjured, but her eyes were too dark, as if the brown centers had eaten the whites.

Each breath left her chest curved like a question, one that might not be answered.

Thank you to my storyteller mother, my judicious father, my bighearted big brother, my kind sis-in-law, and my truth-teller son. (I want to leave you a better world, but I’m afraid I may only leave you stories of longing for it.)

I was impressed with the writing and the author , an art teacher in the public schools, who, at 50 published her first collection. Her other stories included:

Control negro (spoiler warnings)
First person account written by a black professor who has fathered a child in order to play out his theory about average white Caucasians vs black men. He tries to figure out if raising a child a certain way, exposing him to all the right moves would prevent the racism encountered by others. He even calls the cops on his own son as an experiment, one that ultimately proves him wrong.
Virginia is not your home
Melancholy tale of a girl who tries to escape her small town in Virginia, changes her name, becomes accepted in first class life because she attends a boarding school,paid for by her mother's cleaning of the dean's house. She travels to Europe, marries a photographer of some renown. Eventually they have two children and start to lose their wealth, move back to Virginia. Her mother winds up in a home, her kids resent her, her husband leaves, but worse, she is recognized as Virginia again and hates it.
"Don’t accept the moldy hymnals, the marquee salvations—the wayward way that Momma courts heaven like a scornful lover."
Something sweet or our tongues.
Told in third person, the we describes a group of ten year old boys on a school day. They are unruly for the teachers, follow the lead of the biggest bully, and beat up a fellow student. The pleasure it brings them is like the candy the nurse supplies to the diabetic girl in the class
BUYING A HOUSE AHEAD OF THE APOCALYPSE
A mom looking for the right place to move to as the end of things begins. She gives advice on what to look for and what to avoid and what mistakes she has suffered from, hoping her daughter will reunite with her.
Interesting style , very bleak.
"Be ready for the emergency inside the emergency, for when the hordes bang against your door and you find you’ve grown so lonesome too, so ravenous, really, that you rush to let them in."
King of Xandria
Mr. Attah lives in Alexandria where he has brought his children after leaving Lagos, after his wife was killed by young terrorist. He had a job in hospitality but was let go for complaining. Now he pretends to go to work so that his children don't know. His daughter Justina, works for a paper company; his son, his promise, is in 10th grade and struggling. The school keeps trying to tell Mr. Attah that Alex needs special ed services but he gets emotional and confrontational until they finally bring his son in on the IEP meeting and where Alex gets his dad to okay the help he knows he needs.
Sad poignant story without much hope for the future. show less

Not sure how I found this book but I am glad that I did. This is a debut collection by Johnson who is a Virginia public school art teach and is 50. The book consists of 5 short stories and the book title novella. The short stories take place in present day Virginia and deal with various aspects of the black experience. They are well written and very creative. Johnson has a way of making you feel the characters anguish and joy. What sets this collection off and into the outstanding category show more in the novella "My Monticello". Starting with the Charlottesville 2017 protests that turned violent, it presents a world in which climate change and civil unrest are creating an "unraveling" of society with utility grids and cell phone no longer being supported. In this story the city is being attacked by white militias that are seeking to drive out the black/brown people from city and take it back for themselves. The lead character Da'Naisha Love is a 19 year old student at UVA and a direct descendent of Sally Hemmings and Thomas Jefferson. She and 18 others flee the city when they are attacked and end up at Jefferson's plantation at Monticello. They spend the next 19 days taking it over and working together to make a community and deal with the violence around them. There are so many stories going on and they are beautifully done. You feel the scariness of their situation and you see the ties to the past and the uncertain future. Given our current state of polarization and climate change issues, the picture Johnson draws could become a reality. The threads that hold society together may not be as strong as we would like to believe. At 210 pages this is a book that should be read. I look forward to future books by Johnson. show less