The Removed ★★★☆☆

The Removed (Click Here To Buy)

★★★☆☆

The Removed by Brandon Hobson is a fiction book about a Cherokee family preparing for their annual bonfire to honor their son/brother who was killed 15 years earlier by a police officer.

I checked out this book from the library as a Peak Pick, which means I was able to check it out day of and without a hold despite it’s popularity.

Hobson tells the story through 4 lenses. Maria is the mother of Sonja, Edgar, and Ray-Ray, who was killed at age 15 by police officers. She is the wife to Ernest, who has Alzheimer’s and mind fades away a bit more each day. On a whim, Maria helps out a friend by agreeing to foster a young Cherokee boy named Wyatt who feels like a reincarnation of Ray-Ray. Sonja, the daughter, is starting a new relationship with Vin, a man who she has been following for some time. Edgar, the youngest son, is struggling with drug addiction and finds himself in the strange Darkening Land after taking a number of pills in a motel room. The final narrator is Tsala, an ancestor who speaks of the those who have come before who were forced onto the Trail of Tears.

Reading this book felt a bit like being in a dream. The narrative was very fluid, flowing from past to present. I liked the Cherokee myths and stories that were sprinkled throughout. Some pieces felt disjointed and did not seem to come full circle but overall it was the story of a Cherokee family grappling with grief and trauma, both historical and recent, and how those experiences affect our lives for a lifetime.

If you liked The Removed, I also recommend Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward, The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls by Anissa Gray, The Yellow House by Sarah M. Broom, and Blue Highways by William Least-Heat Moon.

Happy reading,

Ms.Bjork