"For Marilynne Robinson’s devotees, John Ames Boughton, the titular Jack of the fourth volume of her award-winning Gilead novels, is one of the most eagerly awaited literary figures since Godot. . . Robinson is acclaimed for her numinous accounts of faith, forgiveness and hope, but read in this electrifying year of national crisis, the Gilead books are unified as well by her unsparing indictment of the American history of racism and inequality, and Christianity’s uneven will to fight them . . . I am looking forward to a fifth volume that will fill in their saga, and I hope it will be called Della.” —Elaine Showalter, The New York Times Book Review
"Jack is the fourth novel in Robinson’s Gilead series, an intergenerational saga of race, religion, family, and forgiveness centered on a small Iowa town. But it is not accurate to call it a sequel or a prequel. Rather, this book and the others—Gilead, Home, and Lila—are more like the Gospels, telling the same story four different ways.” —Casey Cep, The New Yorker
"In Gilead, the first volume, the Rev. John Ames writes that ‘a good sermon is one side of a passionate conversation,’ and Ms. Robinson’s novels work that way, too, replying to one another, querying, clarifying or rebutting, but always sustaining a dialogue that feels as grand and as inexhaustible as the mysteries they explore . . . These novels honor creation by affording us something we only occasionally find in the vastness of existence: a glimpse of eternity, such as it is." —Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal
“With the sublime Jack, [Marilynne Robinson] resumes and deepens her quest, extending it to the contemplation of race . . . Robinson masterfully allows her protagonists to do the heavy lifting of the storytelling and employs deceptively simple dialogue as her primary tool. But make no mistake—there is richness and depth at every turn.” —De'Shawn Charles Winsolw, O, the Oprah Magazine
"Each of [Robinson's] novels has celebrated the fact that the ineffable is inseparable from the quotidian, and rendered the ineffable, quotidian world back to us, peculiar, luminous, and precise . . . There are passages when Jack’s eye glimmers so clearly on the moment, when his dream logic feels so apt, that the whole world Robinson has illuminated with such care and attention reappears, and we are returned to the prophetic everyday.” —Jordan Kisner, The Atlantic
“‘Contemporary classics’ is the oft-used descriptor of Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead series, the correct method of describing these lasting and constant books . . . [Jack is] a love story with the highest stakes . . . Jack poignantly shows us the messy, complex, heartbreaking side to getting everything you ever wanted.” —Emily Temple, Literary Hub
“Not just a meditation on faith and human suffering but a singular portrait of the divine.” —Leah Greenblatt, Entertainment Weekly
"As each new book appears, the world that Marilynne Robinson first created in Gilead becomes more textured and complex . . . What emerges at the end of Jack is the extent of Marilynne Robinson’s command. She shares with George Eliot an interest in large questions and also a fascination with a wildness in the soul, with a sensuality and a spiritual striving that cannot be easily calmed, and can be captured only by the rarest talent.” —Colm Tóibín, 4Columns
“Can love save a man from perdition? That question, braided with romance and religion, is at the heart of Marilynne Robinson’s new novel . . .Robinson cradles [Jack’s] love for Della with the tenderness of a gracious creator.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post
“A sometimes tender, sometimes fraught story of interracial love in a time of trouble . . . The story flows swiftly—and without a hint of inevitability —as Robinson explores a favorite theme, ‘guilt and grace met together.’ An elegantly written proof of the thesis that love conquers all—but not without considerable pain.” —Kirkus (Starred review)
"Robinson’s latest glorious work of metaphysical and moral inquiry, nuanced feelings, intricate imagination, and exquisite sensuousness . . .Myriad manifestations of pain are evoked, but here, too, are beauty, mystery, and joy as Robinson holds us rapt with the exactitude of her perceptions and the exhilaration of her hymnal cadence, and so gracefully elucidates the complex sorrows and wonders of life and spirit.” —Booklist (Starred review)
“Languidly page through a new Marilynne Robinson novel and forget that any world exists outside her rippling cornfields and creaky country kitchens, where slow-building crises of faith and reason are talked through by well-meaning, if troubled, people . . . Prepare to be sucked in by our country’s most thoughtful novelist.” —Vulture
“Robinson’s stellar, revelatory fourth entry in her Gilead cycle . . . is a beautiful, superbly crafted meditation on the redemption and transcendence that love affords.” —Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
"A meditation on human decency and the capacity for redemption." —Joumana Khatib, The New York Times
"Marilynne Robinson returns once more to the lovely, soulful world of Gilead, Iowa, for another evocative novel about the questions of religion and how we understand our place in the world. The author’s spare, poetic style has already conjured up her near-mythic setting in previous books Gilead, Home, and Lila, and to this near-unimpeachable trifecta she now adds Jack, which focuses its attention on John Ames Boughton, a supporting player in those previous stories. The son of Gilead’s Presbyterian minister, his interracial romance with high school teacher Della is traced from its awkward beginnings to heartfelt (and heartbreaking) later days, with all of Robinson’s signature explorations of the strange power of belief—and the lack thereof." —AV Club
★ 09/01/2020
This new work is a prequel to Robinson's Pulitzer-winning Gilead, but one needn't have read the previous novel to appreciate or enjoy it. It follows Jack Boughton, a white drifter, occasional thief, and alcoholic, and his romance with Della Miles, a respectable Black schoolteacher. Although their circumstances (not to mention the law) should keep them apart in St. Louis before the civil rights era, they are drawn to each other based on their shared experience as "preacher's kids" and their love of poetry. After a brief prolog, the novel opens with a lengthy account of a night the two spend in a cemetery talking about life and faith. This helps the reader recognize Jack and Della as soulmates before fully understanding the circumstances of their acquaintance or knowing the extent of Jack's past misdeeds. Against Jack's better judgment and despite considerable pressure from Della's family and a Baptist minister he befriends, Jack is unable to remove himself from Della's life, and her unwavering faith in him leads to a kind of redemption. VERDICT Robinson fans will be hungry for the next chapter in the Gilead saga, and the beauty and humanity of Robinson's prose will win over new fans. Highly recommended. [See Prepub Alert, 2/24/20.]—Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis
If you’re not familiar with Jack Boughton from Marilynne Robinson’s earlier novels, this audiobook is probably not the place to start. Here Jack falls in love with Della, a Black teacher—a romance forbidden in 1940s St. Louis and staunchly opposed by Della’s family. Narrator Adam Verner effectively conveys the mixed elements in Jack’s character—he’s part poet, part bum. Less effective is his portrayal of Della in the dialogues between the two characters, which occupy a substantial portion of the novel. Here listeners may wish a second narrator had taken Della’s part and brought out more of the depth and subtlety of her appealing character. D.A.W. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
