Welcome to Litsy!

#WhereAreYouMonday

Today I find myself in 1920s New York City. Optimism is in the air. The war to end all wars is over and Black Americans have more opportunity than ever in the North.

Book 5 by Toni Morrison that I've read with @HardcoverHearts Author Spotlight series. Set in NYC in 1926, the book opens with a 50 year-old married man shooting his young lover. That's the opening event but not the story. The book explores the stories & back stories of the constellation of people affected by this event. The City looms large as does the music that gives the book its title & its rhythm. There's a sense of play amidst the violence 👇

This is Toni Morrison‘s favorite of all her works, tho - not her most well-known. She is AH-mazing!! Book club was great, I hope to read this again someday, what a treat. Looking forward to reading Paradise soon. (I only have a few weeks and then the TOB anticipated long list hits and then AAaCCKKkK!!!
(Pic from bookclub Hopping Gnome de Plume 🍺)

“At last, at last , everything‘s ahead. The smart ones say so and people listening to them and reading what they write down agree: Here comes the new. Look out.”

Thank you @Ruthiella 😁
It arrived this afternoon. 📚💌📬📦

#Bookclub #BelovedTrilogyPart2

Jazz uses an experimental narrative technique which involves a fragmented insight into the thoughts and psyche of different characters in the novel. The premise is a man who shoots his lover and his “crazy” wife. But as much as that is the premise, this description is the entirety of the plot. Instead it is fluid and focuses on the inner lives of what it is to be black in America in the 1920s. Great concept but far too fragmented for my taste.

#InternationalJazzDay 🎶🎷 #MayMontage 🥳💐♊️

#BookNerd 🤓💙📚

#MayMontage
Day30. Int‘l Jazz Day
#Int‘lJazz

#Int‘lJazzDay #MayMontage

@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

#MarchMagic Day 21: All these books are #SetIn1920s - thanks to @bookriot for this lovely round up: https://bookriot.com/books-set-in-the-1920s/amp/

#love #inquotes @Eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

#manicmonday @CBee @Librariana
I am not home to stare at my book/dvd cases so let's see what I can come up with

📚 Jazz (tagged)
✍️ Shirley Jackson
🍿 John Tucker Must Die
🎤 Elton John (of course! And I have tickets to see him next week!!)
🎶 Jammin (Bon Marley)

#alphabetgame #letterj @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

This is my Toni Morrison year. I am reading through her catalog and I am blown away by each and every book.

"Don't ever think I fell for you, or fell over you. I didn't fall in love, I rose in it" ?

Gorgeous as always and with a thread of darkness. This is part of her Beloved series which I don't really understand as they don't share any characters. I read it is a series to bring attention to the different Black American experiences.
Jazz is a very smooth and deep read, the title is perfect for the atmosphere of the book.

And Jazz gives me 3 Bingos for June.
#bookspinBingo
@thearomaofbooks

No Bookspin books read this month, they are stacking up....

This book is full of rich, loaded language and striking images. A tricky but rewarding read, and one I plan to revisit—I feel that Jazz is meant to be read multiple times and carefully. I have read that Morrison felt Jazz was her best work. I like Beloved and Song of Solomon best but am still impressed with what she has accomplished here. As always is the case in reading Morrison, these characters will haunt me for a while.

#WeRemember Toni Morrison

@eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

#Movie2BookRecs @Klou
#Jazz

Not the best placement for a sticker on a library book, but, up next, Jazz by Toni Morrison! I‘m using this one as my Book Set in the 1920s for The Decades Reading Challenge. 🎷 📚

The brutal aftermath of a brief affair, in which a girl ends up dead and a marriage in shambles. Set in 1920s Harlem, no one expects there to be real consequences outside their own community.

I am in my final vacation week, and it‘s been really nice escaping work and the busy city life for a while. The weather has been great - even here this far north (North of Norway) - the midnight sun has been shining every night☀️

The book was a bit more on the darker side though, like every book I‘ve read by Morrison, and I found it a rather difficult, but good read. The character portraits were excellent. 3.5⭐️

#Reading1001
#1001books

This book had such amazing prose that it slowed me waaay down to make sure I didn‘t miss a sentence! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

I liked this book and I didn‘t love it. Some parts were so dense with wonderful description I struggled to understand what was going on. I‘ve heard so many great things about Toni Morrison, so I‘ll definitely give her another go

#NewYearNewYou Sometimes it‘s good to give into
#temptation I was out on errands,decided I was too busy to stop at the thrift store.I went in anyway and was rewarded with this nice copy of a Toni Morrison book to replace my beat up paperback .

As usual, Toni Morrison‘s prose just glitters it‘s so amazing to read. I do wish this had been a bit longer, I would have loved more time to settle into this writing and these people‘s lives but if my only complaint about a book is that it‘s too short it must have been good! The female characters were fantastic, she won the Nobel prize for very good reason.

‘She wrote about what was difficult and what was necessary and in doing so she unearthed for a generation of people a kind of redemption, a kind of relief.‘ - Chimamanda Adichie

Need to get to everything written by Morrison. Also, here's an interesting article - The Music of Toni Morrison‘s “Jazz” by Xi Chen https://link.medium.com/crxTOtbEj1

#music #movember
@Cinfhen

“Don't ever think I fell for you, or fell over you. I didn't fall in love, I rose in it.” -Jazz

Missing Toni Morrison already.

I went through a phase where all I wanted to read, could read, was Toni Morrison. I still can‘t put into words how her books, her characters made me feel but I am so glad we have her legacy.
#blacklitsy

#MusicalTitles #JazzyJune

The Queen does not disappoint!
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Blues man. Black and bluesman.

Blacktherefore blue man.

water came to you—not you to it

Aptly titled, this book is so smooth and lyrical. It is an enjoyable read.

#currentlyreading
Thought this was an appropriate choice for black history month. I actually got this book at a book swap which is why the book is a little rough around the edges. I personally like knowing my book belonged to someone else. It has a different energy from newly bought books. Not sure what I‘m getting into but what books have you gotten at a book swap?

#happyreading #blackauthor #femalewriter
#blackhistorymonth

Whoa!! 14% in and I am love with the writing style. It is written like a song. Morrison is so good!!!

It's always cheesecake o'clock on Sundays 😋

I'm upping my goal by a few books this year because in 2018 I ended up reading a whopping total of 75 books of my initial goal of 52! I've never read so much - very proud!
My main reading goal in 2019 is to finish Toni Morrison's published fiction.

HAPPY NEW YEAR, LITTENS!😍📚👏🥂

Toni Morrison is ALWAYS such a delight to read. I just can't even anymore 😭

#WinterWonderland #AngelOfHarlem

I‘ve not read this, but it‘s on a list of must-read books about New York, and it‘s set in 1920s Harlem.

Day 6 - #jazz #quotsynov18

A few #orangebooks by women: 2 read (Station Eleven and Alias Grace), both great, and 2 TBR (Jazz and Men We Reaped), which I've heard nothing but good things about!

#31bookpics @howjessreads

J-Jazz by Toni Morrison
O-On Beauty by Zaddie Smith
C-Coffee Will Make You Black by April Sinclair
E-Elbow Room by James Allen McPherson
L-Liar's Game by Eric Jerome Dickey
Y-Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim
N-Night Hawk by Beverly Jenkins
@LibrarianRyan

#Riotgrams - Spell June in book titles:

J - Jazz
U - Uprooted
N - Night Road
E - Eon

Toni Morrison is an all-time favorite. Eon consumed my time for a couple of days as stories with dragons, magic and girl-power will always do.

The plot is twisted & Morrison is always a struggle for me to start reading until I sink into the prose & just let it flow over me. She writes of such dark things, but in a way it almost reads like poetry. Although I wouldn‘t give the surface plot high marks, where the story shines is the mini-backstories of its characters as they reveal the many facets & hardships of African American life from slavery through the 20‘s.

#Reading1001