4.5 stars

Black Girl, Unlimited was my absolutely favorite book in the year that I read it. In this follow-up book, Echo Brown manages to capture all of what made her debut a unique experience, though there are some things about this portion of this biography/magic hybrid that are meaningfully different.

First, because we start Black Girl, Unlimited at the beginning of Echo's story, that book seemed to have a more natural beginning, middle and end. In The Chosen One, it feels like what it is-- picking up a story in the middle and ending it still somewhere in the middle. It felt like it lent itself a little less naturally to the traditional narrative arc you expect because this is a novel. In that way, this feels a little more like the biography it also is. It's a snap-shot book. We are simply looking in at a specific window of time and that may turn some readers off.

Second, this builds in a lot of ways on top of Black Girl, Unlimited, even thematically. We watch Echo unpacking a lot of the trauma we saw her experience in the earlier book. It is also majorly about the way that systems fail people of color, highlighting the advantages that are baked into the system for white people. And because of that, we watch Echo navigate asking for help and contending with being "the chosen one" and the sort of pressure that gets put upon anyone who does break out of certain levels of poverty or disadvantage.

Once again, I'm left in awe of Echo Brown's voice and the way she has chosen to share her story. The blend of magical realism, the beautiful language, the clear-eyed view of her own experiences-- these are books that just beg to be experienced.

cw: rape (in the past), child abuse, drug abuse, alcohol use, mental illness, ptsd, emir, drowning, racism, generational trauma, hallucinations


Merged review:

4.5 stars

Black Girl, Unlimited was my absolutely favorite book in the year that I read it. In this follow-up book, Echo Brown manages to capture all of what made her debut a unique experience, though there are some things about this portion of this biography/magic hybrid that are meaningfully different.

First, because we start Black Girl, Unlimited at the beginning of Echo's story, that book seemed to have a more natural beginning, middle and end. In The Chosen One, it feels like what it is-- picking up a story in the middle and ending it still somewhere in the middle. It felt like it lent itself a little less naturally to the traditional narrative arc you expect because this is a novel. In that way, this feels a little more like the biography it also is. It's a snap-shot book. We are simply looking in at a specific window of time and that may turn some readers off.

Second, this builds in a lot of ways on top of Black Girl, Unlimited, even thematically. We watch Echo unpacking a lot of the trauma we saw her experience in the earlier book. It is also majorly about the way that systems fail people of color, highlighting the advantages that are baked into the system for white people. And because of that, we watch Echo navigate asking for help and contending with being "the chosen one" and the sort of pressure that gets put upon anyone who does break out of certain levels of poverty or disadvantage.

Once again, I'm left in awe of Echo Brown's voice and the way she has chosen to share her story. The blend of magical realism, the beautiful language, the clear-eyed view of her own experiences-- these are books that just beg to be experienced.

cw: rape (in the past), child abuse, drug abuse, alcohol use, mental illness, ptsd, emir, drowning, racism, generational trauma, hallucinations