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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Feb 2021, 336 pages
Paperback:
Feb 2022, 352 pages
Book Reviewed by:
Valerie Morales
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Powerful and revealing, The Kindest Lie captures the heartbreaking divide between Black and white communities and offers both an unflinching view of motherhood in contemporary America and the never-ending quest to achieve the American Dream.
Named a Most Anticipated book by O Magazine * GMA * Elle * Marie Claire * Good Housekeeping * NBC News * Shondaland * Chicago Tribune * Woman's Day * Refinery 29 * Bustle * The Millions * New York Post * Parade * Hello! Magazine * PopSugar * and more!
A promise could betray you.
It's 2008, and the inauguration of President Barack Obama ushers in a new kind of hope. In Chicago, Ruth Tuttle, an Ivy-League educated Black engineer, is married to a kind and successful man. He's eager to start a family, but Ruth is uncertain. She has never gotten over the baby she gave birth to—and was forced to leave behind—when she was a teenager. She had promised her family she'd never look back, but Ruth knows that to move forward, she must make peace with the past.
Returning home, Ruth discovers the Indiana factory town of her youth is plagued by unemployment, racism, and despair. As she begins digging into the past, she unexpectedly befriends Midnight, a young white boy who is also adrift and looking for connection. Just as Ruth is about to uncover a burning secret her family desperately wants to keep hidden, a traumatic incident strains the town's already searing racial tensions, sending Ruth and Midnight on a collision course that could upend both their lives.
One
Ruth
No one talked about what happened in the summer of 1997 in the house where Ruth Tuttle had grown up. In fact, there were days she remained certain she had never given birth at all. Somehow, she convinced herself that her life began when she drove away from that little shotgun house in Indiana without her baby. She had been only seventeen.
A lie could be kind to you if you wanted it to be, if you let it. With every year that passed, it became easier to put more distance between her old life and her new one. If the titles of doctor and lawyer had signaled success back in the day, then engineer had to be the 2.0 symbol that you'd made it. And she had. With Yale University conferring her degree and lending its good name to her, there was no question. And if the proof weren't in her pedigree, it manifested in her marriage to a PepsiCo marketing executive.
The upcoming presidential election stirred an unusual optimism in her husband, Xavier, and he fancied himself having ...
Here are some of the comments posted about The Kindest Lie.
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"[A] little girl needed a daddy: the first man she would ever try to impress...one who would set the bar so high that no other man could reach it." What do you think of this statement?
You first fall in love with your Daddy. He is your example of what a man should be. Good or bad! You either gravitate towards that type of mate or you know you should avoid that role model. - taking.mytime
Are the choices Mama makes to protect Ruth and Eli understandable and forgivable?
Mama did the best she knew how with what she had available. She was living her dreams thru Ruth and did not want obstacles in the way. She wanted Ruth out of their town and lifestyle. Eli was a bit different. Once Ruth was on her way, Mama helped Eli... - taking.mytime
Corey and Midnight process their run-in with Dale at the convenience store very differently. How do their racial identities shape their reactions?
Corey was black - he could not take a scuffle as easily as Midnight could. Corey was seen in a different light by any person in charge - young black men are killed for less than what happened in that store. For Midnight it was just an 'incident&... - taking.mytime
Discuss the relationship between Ruth and Midnight
Ruth and Midnight gave the other what they were looking for and needed. Midnight needed and wanted a Mother, Ruth wanted a son. Even tho they were of different races they made a good match. They fulfilled the hole in the other one. - taking.mytime
Do you think Ruth is to blame for walking away from her child? Did she have a choice or was she robbed of it?
Ruth was robbed, but what was she to do? At 17, she does not have say over her own life, not to mention a child's. It is heart-wrenching to lose the son and yet she cannot blame herself. - djcminor
Part of what is so captivating about The Kindest Lie is that Johnson nestles white grievances — "Black people are taking over everything" — next to black trauma. James Baldwin once said, "The imagination of a novelist has everything to do with what happens to his material." In The Kindest Lie, Johnson imagines black shame. Conscious of that shame, she builds Ruth's story with gentleness. She stacks like a sandcastle all the parts of the character, so by the end we are just as attached as Ruth is to her lost baby, her marriage, her career ambivalence, her love for her grandmother and brother...continued
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(Reviewed by Valerie Morales).
Gabriel Bump, author of Everywhere You Don't Belong
In The Kindest Lie, Nancy Johnson gives us two unforgettable characters. Ruth and Midnight represent different Americas: one trending up, one spiraling down. Johnson—through graceful sentences, tenderness, dramatic expertise, and overflowing empathy—is able to twist these Americas into a singular portrait of a country in transition. This enviable debut enlightens while breaking your heart. A truly beautiful achievement. Jodi Picoult
The Kindest Lie is a deep dive into how we define family, what it means to be a mother, what secrets we owe to those we love, and what it means to grow up Black. This beautifully crafted debut will keep you asking these questions and more. Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, author of The Revisioners
A heart-wrenching portrayal of an unlikely bond, and a profound nod to the fallacy of post-racial America—The Kindest Lie is nuanced, spellbinding, and necessary. Rumaan Alam, New York Times bestselling author of Leave the World Behind
The Kindest Lie is the story of one family that reveals the larger story of America itself. Taut and surprising, Nancy Johnson's debut novel tackles complex issues—ambition, romance, class—with the lightest of touches.Years ago, comedian Chris Rock told a joke: "All my black friends have a bunch of white friends and all my white friends have one black friend." It is one of those bits of humor where the laughter leaves you reflecting on a sadder truth. Particularly, that racial segregation is still normalized in white communities. To have more than one black friend is an anomaly.
As Nancy Johnson shows in her novel The Kindest Lie, interracial friendships are contextually complicated. People of different races talk about race differently. According to Pew Research data, 63% of blacks and 66% of Asians say that race or race relations come up in conversations with family and friends. 50% of whites and 49% of Hispanics say the same. But 27% of blacks say ...
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