We Deserve Monuments by Jas Hammonds

Abstract

Reviewed by: We Deserve Monuments by Jas Hammonds Kate Quealy-Gainer, Editor Hammonds, Jas We Deserve Monuments. Roaring Brook, 2022 [384p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781250816559 $18.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781250816566 $10.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 7-10 When her estranged grandmother falls ill, high school senior Avery and her parents return to Bardell, Georgia, to care for her, despite Avery’s mother falling out with Mama Letty years ago. The culture shock between Avery’s life in Washington, D.C., and smalltown, rural Georgia is intense, especially when she’s one of the few Black kids at her elite, competitive school. She manages to make friends with classmates Simone and Jade, but both come with their own share of drama. Simone is struggling with her sexuality and how it would fit with her Black mother’s devotion to Christianity, while Jade is a white girl wrestling with her wealthy family’s casual racism and devotion to traditions rooted in white supremacy. When an insidious connection between Mama Letty and Jade’s family is revealed, Avery is forced to reckon with the traumatic ripples of a horrific, decades-old deed. Avery’s first-person narration can get frustratingly myopic at times, and the book’s true emotion is found in interspersed third-person chapters that zoom out to examine the messy web of secrets, violence, grief, and guilt that has ensnared her family in a cycle of trauma. Mama Letty is especially complex, and while the book brings compassion and a tenderness to her portrayal, it is also clear-eyed about the damage she has wrought upon her daughter. There’s a larger message here about offering forgiveness at a personal, intimate level while still demanding contrition and reparations from a system that builds white wealth and luxury. Copyright © 2022 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois