Where The Line Bleeds

Reviews

"Where the Line Bleeds is a rich, subtle, lyrical novel by an important new writer. Jesmyn Ward writes with a miniaturist's attention to detail, with dazzling elegance and precision, but is unwaveringly compassionate in her exploration of character and place. There is suspense here, along with keen insight--the qualities that keep the pages turning. But there is also poetry, and mystery--the qualities that cause the reader to linger in wonder." --Laura Kasischke, author of The Life Before Her Eyes "Jesmyn Ward's debut novel is eloquent in its description of young lives at risk; she's authoritative both when writing of the doomed and prospect of salvation. The lyric gifts displayed in Where The Line Bleeds are very impressive indeed, and the world evoked--the rural south, with its complex web of family devotion and betrayal--is vivid from first page to last. A major talent here." --Nicholas Delbanco, author of Spring and Fall and The Count of Concord "Bursting with life--joyous, loving, frustrated and furious--Where the Line Bleeds marks the forceful debut of an exceptional new talent. Jesmyn Ward's vision is at once searingly honest and sweepingly empathic. Her vibrant portrait of a Mississippi Gulf Coast town is peopled by some of the most movingly, achingly human characters I've encountered in fiction in years." --Peter Ho Davies, author of The Welsh Girl "Ward's beautiful language allows the location and characters to come alive ... will appeal to teens who can see themselves here or who are interested in discovering realities far from their own lives." --School Library Journal "A richly textured tale ... like the best fiction, [it] creates its own world." --New Orleans Times-Picayune "I feel like I have read the debut work of the next Faulkner, or Capote, or O'Connor, a great Southern writer whom my children might some day read in their college classes." --Oxford Eagle "A lyrical yet clear-eyed portrait of a rural South and an African-American reality that are rarely depicted." --Boston Globe "A promising debut." --Kirkus Reviews "Lushly descriptive prose ... with stunning precision. Her prodigious talent and fearless portrayal of a world too often overlooked make her novel a powerful choice for our seventeenth Essence Book Club Recommended Read." --Essence "A resonant novel for any reader." --Booklist "A starkly beautiful debut ... A fresh new voice in American literature." --Publishers Weekly