The writing in this book is so beautiful and lyrical
This is mainly a character driven story. The story is brutal and harrowing
The ending will be with me forever

In the past year or so, several books have been compared to the masterworks of Toni Morrison. I’ve read at least two of them–The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates, and Conjure Women by Afia Atakora–and it’s been easy enough to see where the comparisons come from–both have been novels about enslaved people and the toll that slavery exacts upon the humanity of oppressors and oppressed–but none of those books has been as deserving of the accolade as Robert Jones Jr.’s The Prophets.

The novel deals with the love between two enslaved men on a Mississippi plantation in the late 1700s or early 1800s (no clearer assessment can be made regarding the time period; it seems likely that it’s before Britain ceases to participate in the transatlantic slave trade, since the master’s long-lost cousin, now an overseer on the plantation, works his passage over from England as a deckhand on a slave ship.) These two young men, Isaiah and Samuel, share a love that every slave on the plantation recognizes as nourishing; it seems to light them up from the inside, and their movement through the world is evidence of their love’s power. What it renders difficult, however, is the forced breeding programme run by the plantation’s owner, Paul. When one of the boys not only refuses to rape a fellow slave woman but is actually physically unable to, Paul turns to another slave, Amos, who wants to preach. Giving Amos the power of literacy via the Bible and the license to talk about Jesus on Sunday mornings, Paul hopes to convert his whole slave population to Christianity, foment hatred of Isaiah and Samuel as sodomites, and keep potential rebellion unfulfilled by dangling the hope of eternal heavenly reward for patient earthly suffering.

One of the most interesting things about The Prophets is its integration of African religious and spiritual practices into the lives of its characters. Because it’s set at a point in history when Christianity has not yet become a default worldview for Black enslaved people living in America, Jones can explore blood memory, which lives in many of the enslaved women whose perspectives litter the book. (Almost every named character gets a point-of-view chapter; it’s fortunate that Jones generally leaves each perspective behind him once he’s used it, or things would get unwieldy. However, the skill with which he inhabits the subtle distinctions of each character’s thoughts and feelings about their position in the world makes such a proliferation feel less superfluous than it usually does.) Maggie is the gatekeeper of blood memory on the plantation (which, though named for Paul’s mother Elizabeth, is known by a more colloquial, and more telling, name: Empty). She brings other women together to perform healing rituals with herbs and recitation when Isaiah and Samuel are whipped. She sees shadows move. She feels the presence of ancestors. She knows there were other ways. Some of the other women also have this ability: in particular, Puah, a teenage girl in fruitless love with Samuel, and Sarah, a woman who once loved another woman as Isaiah and Samuel love each other.

Perhaps the aspect of traditional religion as Jones portrays it that will surprise the greatest number of readers is its acceptance of queer sexualities. Intercut chapters show life in a pre-slavery Kosongo village ruled over by a female king, Akusa. Akusa has six wives, some of whom are women and some of whom are men. There are more than two possibilities, anyway: you can be woman, man, free, or all. When Akusa’s village first encounters a white person, a “skinless” Portuguese missionary named Brother Gabriel brought to them by an emissary from a neighbouring village that has turned quisling, he is invited to participate in a feast celebrating the marriage of two warriors, Kosii and Elewa. His inability to understand the nature of the celebration is grounded in the fact that they are both men. To King Akusa, Gabriel’s incomprehension is proof of idiocy:

“Two men?” These colorless people had the strangest system of grouping things together by what they did not understand rather than by what they did. He could see bodies, but it was clear that he could not see spirits. […]

“Impossible,” she said with a laugh. “They are bonded. Do you not see?”

“I think your people would benefit from our religion,” Brother Gabriel said.
The Prophets, Robert Jones Jr., p. 208

This has not quite been destroyed by the time Isaiah and Samuel are living in Empty. Amos, the aspiring preacher, himself thinks of a slave he knew named Henry who would answer only to Emma, and is able to absorb this: Henry/Emma is clearly a woman inside. Jones’s thesis is very clear: the damage wrought on cultures that functioned perfectly, indeed better than contemporaneous white culture did, was perpetrated not merely with guns and shackles, but with Bibles.

There are also interlaced chapters in which the voices of the ancestors speak. Unattributed, lyrical, often contradictory and confusing, impossible to pin down, these polylogues are simultaneously the most “difficult” aspect of The Prophets and the aspect that elevates it to greatness. Jones is not content to tell a simple historical story of love and struggle and failure and death. The ancestors’ voices are what make that struggle both a source of rage and a source of pride. I am not Black and have (as far as I know) no Black ancestry, and these sections were not written for me, but I can see in them the harnessed artistic expression of fury and dignity, of people whose past, present and future is channeled through shared memory and tradition. If I’m waxing unbecomingly lyrical myself here, it’s because the power of these sections renders commentary somewhat presumptuous. Jones taps into a voice that speaks down generations, through centuries. The shivers that he’s able to raise on the back of the reader’s neck with this voice are the clearest indication that his book truly does approach Morrisonian heights.

Following an open evening via a Zoom call with Quercus I was so honoured to little to Robert Jones Jr and he’s view on his book and it was fascinating. The way he talked about his book was so interesting I was hooked and knew I had to read it. I’m so glad I did,
Wonderful, fascinating & interesting

I have quite mixed feelings about this book. On the positive side, much of it is a deep and intriguing exploration into life and culture during slavery in southern America. Many of the characters are well drawn, and for the most part the narrative moves along at a good pace. On the negative, the writing style is at times labourious, weighed down by movement descriptions (pointless) but overall it was the lack of clarity about who is who, what is what that let it down for me. On a few occasions it felt pretentious in tone and overly lyrical despite passages that were totally engrossing. On the whole if felt rather self-indulgent and could have done with a few edits/rewrites as there was also a lot of good stuff in there.

This book was heartbreaking and emotional and deals with some pretty deep and difficult topics, but does this very well, it is important to check the trigger warnings before starting this one

Thank you to riverrun/quercus for my earc of this book.
A beautifully written book but so heartbreaking and such an emotional and painful topic.

A difficult and painful read. Despite the eloquent writing style.and the story, I was unable to finish the novel.

Unfortunately this book was not for me. Other readers may enjoy it more, but I could not get into it and ultimately did not finish it.

Wow, wow, wow.
It's such a conflict enjoying a book when the whole plot is a painful story based on the heartbreaking reality of the lives of Black slaves. This book is not an easy read, there are horrors throughout as the characters are beaten, raped, ripped from their families and worked to death by their "masters"; it is absolutely heartbreaking and sickening that truth lies in these pages.
But underneath it all is the strength of love, family and community.
The characters are wonderfully written. Their relationships with each other are beautiful and while some are driven by fear or emotions, the two men at the centre of this story are loyal to each other only. They work hard, keep their heads down and love each other hard. Their community loves them and cherishes them as they all try and protect each other from their owners.
It really is a wonderful book despite it being so heartbreakingly shocking and painful.
The Prophets builds to a really intense, devastating ending that really had me gripped but painfully so. I cried, put the book down in shock and picked it up again in the hope of justice. It pulled me all over the place emotionally and broke my heart.
5 stars for an exquisitely written book with some really beautiful characters living in a time of horror and despair.
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Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and Robert Jones Jr. for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Set in the south of the US during slavery times and centred around the gay love story between two slaves, this novel is symphonic in its orchestration and baroque in its form. Though the heart of the story is Samuel's and Isaiah's tender and pure relationship, the point of view throughout the narration is spread across the inhabitants of Empty, as the plantation is known, including the white ones.

While at first I felt the style, setting and characterisation were convincing and the story drew me in, I must confess that by nearly mid-way through it, the book lost me and I found myself not caring.

And how can you not care about a story like this?

I started confusing the different characters and their respective histories, I felt the narration just dragged, the language was unnecessarily heavy and got in the way. In other words, the spell of fiction was broken.

Faced with pulling myself through the second half of the book for the sake of finishing it, I did the unthinkable and shelved it. Let's face it - I'm not getting any younger and the TBR shelf is swelling. So this might just be my new year resolution: learn to let go of what doesn't manage to possess you.


Many thanks to Quercus Books and NetGalley for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Really enjoyed this one. Great characters and a really engaging plot. Definitely an author I'll read more of.

What a powerful book !. It takes place on Halifax plantation which is nicknamed Empty by the slaves.

We meet Samuel and Isaiah who work and live with the animals on the plantation ruled over by Massa Paul. The descriptions of the slavery are brutal and hard to read (rather like in The Underground Railroad) , but it's necessary to read them so as to understand what happened in the degradation and dehumanizing of these fellow humans. It took me a long time to read parts of this as they were so distressing.
Sometimes the worst treatment comes from others that you may have trusted , step forward Amos.

It's told from multiple view points which makes it a much richer story to reflect the fact that we need to listen to others to try and understand.
Other books it reminded me of were The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead, The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates and Washington Black by Esi Edugyan.

It's a book about the worst cruelty of humankind but that is balanced by the love in the book..

An unforgettable, devastatingly good novel. The love between Samuel and Isaiah is a sweetness at the centre of a hopeless, horrific situation as they work together on the plantation called Empty. Robert Jones' beautiful writing pulls you deep into the characters' inner lives as well as revealing the brutality of enslavement. This is a gripping, resonant and piercingly insightful book that deserves to win all the prizes.

This is one of those rare books that left me stunned after reading. Empathetic, brutal and powerful.

I would like to extend my gratitude to NetGalley for giving me this advanced readers’ copy in exchange for an honest and frank review.

This book was beautiful. The writing was sensational. I have never read a book like this before. It was steeped in Christianity which was not too much for me. I would recommend this book to everyone, however, may be too much for someone who is not into religion.

The novel tells at its core the story of Samuel and Isaiah living and loving on a slave cotton plantation (Elizabeth/Empty) in Mississippi – Samuel born on the plantation (we only find out his mother late in the novel), Isaiah bought to the plantation, bound in chains, with a group of other slaves as young child (his mother’s lament for him – and his real name - opening the narrative). The plantation is run by Paul, married to Ruth – their only son (the housemaid/cook Maggie having worked to prevent any more children surviving) Timothy returning from a spell at college up North where his mind and sexuality have been partly turned away from their conventional, slave-owning, conservative Southern roots.

One of the slaves Amos (married to Essie – although it is clear to the dismay of both that her recently born son Solomon’s father is actually Paul) – proposes a Paul that he will preach Christianity to the other slaves – hoping to lead them to a docility and acceptance of their plight in exchange for Paul leaving Essie alone. He quickly realises though that Samuel and Isaiah are both a barrier to and a key opportunity of his plans. Paul has effectively been raising them as studs but Amos realises their lack of success in the breeding encounters forced on them is actually a willing choice due to their (in his eyes incomprehensible and unnatural) love for each other – and he leads the plantation in freezing them out of communal life.

Other key characters on the plantation include: Adam – an almost white unacknowledged son of Paul who works as his coach driver; James – Paul’s cousin, who arrived a the plantation after being orphaned in England and working his passage on a slave ship – and who now works as the overseer;
Beulah/Be-Auntie – her identity having been worn down and on a mission to turn the young boy slaves away from toxic masculinity – but who also ends up sleeping with Amos to save Essie from his attentions when she was pregnant; Puah – a young girl living with Be-Auntie and in love with Samuel; Sarah – one of the only slaves on the state to have come from Africa on a slave ship and as a result the closest to ancestral beliefs

All of these come together in an explosive conclusion.

The book also ranges back to Africa – and to a Kingdom run by a lesbian King, visited to devastating effect by white Europeans (the first visit being from some missionaries unable to understand an all male bonding/marriage ceremony they are invited to attend. Later some chapters follow these to men on the slave ship. We also have an ancestral Greek chorus which bookends (and is threaded through) the novel.

Each of the plantation characters above have third party point of view chapters named after them but many other chapters are named biblically – ranging across the old Testament and even in tow cases the Apocrypha (this is of course on top of the biblical names of all of the characters above): Judges, Proverbs, Psalms, Deuteronomy, Genesis, I Kings, Leviticus, Babel, Balm in Gilead, Romans, II Kings, Nebuchadnezzar, Maccabees, The Revelations of Judas, Chronicles, Bel and the Dragon, Lamentations, Songs of Songs, Numbers, Exodus, Isaiah, New Covenant.

The author blogs as the “Son of Baldwin” with 150+K followers on Facebook – the name showing one of his key literary influences alongside Toni Morrison, with a tribute to Baldwin starting a simply astonishing Acknowledgements at the back of the novel running to 10 pages and many hundreds of names including artists, singers, screen-stars as well as personal acquaintances before ending movingly with a tribute to many victims of racial violence “we speak your names” and an acknowledgment of First Nation people and the African dispora.

An acknowledgments section which is heartfelt, multi-faceted, inspired, exploring love alongside the terrible violence, but one which is also sprawling and a little bewildering – and I think that also serves as a description for the novel.

I actually had a Goodreads ARC of it early in the year (as part of a series of ARCs I requested based on 2021 preview features) but actually could not quite get on with the novel and so declined to review it – only to revisit it now ahead of what I think is a very likely Booker longlisting.

My issues on a first read were two fold – one I think general (what I perceived as the overwriting in the book) and one more personal (the biblical parts) - and I felt it best to see more of what others thought and what the author intended.

On the first I have to say I found the writing on the one hand striking, lyrical, beautifully crafted and distinctive, but on the other almost entirely unnatural/artificial. Every character (including and perhaps especially Paul/Ruth/Timothy) seems to speak in imagery somewhere on a spectrum between metaphor and riddle – and for me this did not quite work. I wondered if a better device would have been to have these views expressed on their behalf (perhaps in a way which explored each character’s deeper motivations and feelings) by an omniscient narrator (perhaps making further use of the ancestral chorus).

An otherwise effusive Guardian review subsequently said “There are too many convoluted metaphors tangled in their own imagery.”; asked about this the author said

I think I read that review and I thought, “Ok. That’s your opinion.” But I’m curious as to the race of the reviewer because a lot of metaphors they found confounding are deeply steeped in Black cultural references. So if there are Black people who have a certain upbringing, meaning deeply rooted in the church, or have deep Southern roots, they’ll recognize a lot of that stuff that some reviewers see as complicated, convoluted, confounding, unclear …… When I was writing this book, I was writing for a particular audience. In my mind, the audience was totally Black and mostly queer and likely in America, if not American themselves. So in writing to that specific audience, there’s bound to be people who come to it and see it as confusion rather than clarity

So I slightly struggle to know if its appropriate for me to comment as I did – and instead perhaps I will quote the New Yorker review by a Professor of English and Afro-American studies – who is more the target audience

Conversation is a problem throughout “The Prophets.” The novel’s characters tend to characterize their surroundings identically, with a special eye for apprehending the trauma soaked into every blade of grass, every ache, every object they encounter. Natural and farmland images abound, metaphors for violence and violent feelings …. The novel parades these brutal observations before us, for the sake of awe, I suppose. Jones wants to bestow gravitas on the enslaved condition, perhaps as a means of repair, of compensating for the elisions of historical records. But tones of transcendence and glory have a way of obstructing interiority, the lifeblood of the novel; they leave little gap between who someone is and what has been made of them. Characters in “The Prophets” speak to each other not in conversation but in aphorisms that attempt to communicate an ur-Black truth …. Despite the loss of certain old ways, certain sure histories, “The Prophets” is preoccupied with sifting the sands of time, searching for an authenticity that can’t be retrieved, at the expense of uncovering the connections between people.

The second I feel much better qualified to talk about – I have seen a number of reviews regretting that a lack of biblical knowledge prevents them from understanding the copious references. Unfortunately such knowledge (and I have read the Bible cover-to-cover, spread over a year or so, on many occasions) also prevented me from understanding the references: other than the very obvious (Genesis for beginnings, 1 and 2 Kings for the African stories, Exodus for an escape, Balm for when some ancestral medicine is given to the boys to heal their wounds after a punitive ordeal) I really struggled to see many links and many others (the slave parts of Exodus including the role of Puah as a midwife, Maccabees for taking action despite a lack of prophetic guidance, Judges for a time before Kings) seemed to me to be missed. I had been drawn to the novel thinking that a book which explored how Southern American Christianity somehow became obsessed with homosexuality (number of mentions in the gospel – nil), indifferent to the dangers of money (number of mentions in the gospel – 800) and used somehow to justify slavery would be challenging but important for me – but the novel seemed instead to motivated more by an understandable difficulty in distinguishing a Faith from the way in which some of its followers pervert it.

Nevertheless an important novel - perhaps one of the most widely discussed literary novels of 2021 and one destined I am sure to feature in literary prize lists.

Every single sentence is quite literally astounding and to be able to write like a poet through an entire novel is just one element of this book that makes it so, so WOW. Another level!

Such a great story - we've sold loads in my bookstore and recommend it to a lot of readers. Definitely my style of book and setting in terms of location and era and also subject matter.

In the interests of full disclosure I did not finish this book. While I admired the premise and the story telling them writing style was hard for me to follow and become immersed in. It was not a bad book it was just not the book for me

Certainly lyrical The Prophets is a promising debut. I would have however preferred if the story had focused more on Samuel and Isaiah rather than getting lost in other perspectives. I also think that this will appeal more to readers with stronger ties to religion than I have as I struggled a lot with the Christianity in this novel.