"There There" by Tommy Orange: A Novel by Tommy Orange & Co.

Amy Anderson: "There There" by Tommy Orange is a compelling and thought-provoking novel that weaves together the diverse experiences of urban Native Americans in Oakland, California. The narrative unfolds through a multitude of perspectives, creating a rich tapestry of interconnected stories.

Orange skillfully explores themes of identity, heritage, and the impact of historical trauma on contemporary Native lives. The characters are vividly drawn, each carrying their own struggles and aspirations, contributing to the complexity of the overall narrative.

The title, "There There," is a poignant reflection on the displacement and erasure faced by Native communities, highlighting the tension between tradition and modernity. The novel also delves into the power of storytelling and the reclaiming of cultural narratives.

The prose is lyrical and evocative, capturing the essence of the characters' emotions and experiences. While the nonlinear structure may be challenging for some readers, it adds depth and layers to the storytelling.

"There There" is a powerful and timely exploration of Native American identity in an urban context, shedding light on the multifaceted...

United States on Nov 13, 2023

Sarahsbookstacks: I read this over several days to avoid a meltdown, it did not work. Not a light read, but an important one.

United States on Oct 09, 2023

#EmptyNestReader: “Silence is not just silence but is not speaking up.”
There, There is a beautifully written, captivating story of present-day Native Americans living in Oakland, CA. Urban Indians are that generation born in the city. "We’ve been moving for a long time, but the land moves with you like memory. An Urban Indian belongs to the city, and cities belong to the earth. Everything here is formed in relation to every other living and nonliving thing…” "Getting us to cities was supposed to be the final, necessary step in our assimilation, absorption, erasure, completion of a five hundred year old genocidal campaign. But the city made us new, and we made it ours.“

The book follows the lives of 12 characters and explores what it means to be an Indian or, perhaps more importantly, feel like an Indian. A formidable look at the life of Native Americans a people affected by dislocation, disjointed identities, fractured families, misinformation, abuse, denial and prejudice yet sustained by culture, tradition and hope.
The story line and the characters are eventually drawn into one story when the characters all attend the Big Oakland Powwow. "Here history is celebrated,...

United States on Sep 14, 2023

JL: Schwer zugängliche Sprache, schöne Ausgabe.
Sicherlich eher etwas für literarische Partikular- Interessen.

Germany on Aug 06, 2023

Daniel from Norwich: At the Big Oakland Powwow, there’s $50,000 of prize money and a plot to steal it. ‘There There’ tells the story of the robbery and why a handful of the Urban Native American attendees come to the event.

Jacquie Red Feather travels from Phoenix with event emcee, Harvey, a man she hasn’t seen since he raped her forty-two years ago. A daughter was conceived during the rape and was given away for adoption when Jacquie was seventeen. The daughter, Blue, is head of the powwow committee.

Jacquie had a second daughter, Jamie, a heroin addict who killed herself, leaving three sons. Jacquie’s younger half-sister, Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield, adopted Jacquie’s grandsons. Orvil (14) likes to dance in traditional Indian regalia. He takes his brothers, Loother (12) and Lony (10), to the powwow where he enters a dance competition. Opal goes to the powwow in secret to watch Orvil dance.

Like Jacquie, Harvey is an alcoholic. He unwittingly fathered another child during a wild night with a white woman called Karen. The child, Edwin Black, was raised by Karen. Edwin is tech-savvy and holds a master’s degree in comparative literature. He successfully applies for...

United Kingdom on Jul 23, 2023

Waïza: Étant en licence d'anglais, je devais le lire. Très bon livre

France on Apr 06, 2023

Vivek Tejuja: There’s so much happening in There There, but not once did it feel overwhelming or confusing. I could understand each character, their motivations, and the plot as well, right till the end when it all unravels. Actually., it starts unravelling quite early on. As early on as the third chapter or so.

There There (title referring to a quote by Gertrude Stein, which is out of context, but works here) by Tommy Orange is not only important because of the socio-political issues it raises or the ones that are deep-rooted in the novel. It is also important because it is written so well and needs to be read widely. There are 12 characters whose lives are interwoven. They are all Native Americans, living or have lived in Oakland, California. They are all dealing with identity issues, and want to make more sense of their lives, and do better at living. And all their stories and lives converge and meet at the Big Oakland Powwow.

It is a Canterbury Tales like novel, with each narrative unfolding, and un-layering till we get to the end. At the heart of it though it is about Native Americans and their lives – their stories, the injustices, the motivations, the histories deep...

India on Jan 08, 2021

AlejandraAlejandra: Orange’s writing style grabs you from the beginning and does not let go. The book starts out strong with a prologue that hits you with a bunch of unwhitewashed historical facts, setting the honest tone for the rest of the novel.
At first I thought the book consisted of independent essays, but in the second half the stories start to converge bringing the stories together. Each character tells a unique story about self-discovery, but these are not stories of reservation life by stereotypical Indians as portrayed by the media, they are the stories of 12 Native Americans trying to figure out what life in Oakland means to them. Some of the characters were raised in Native American culture, while others are bicultural or have a only name, filled with a long history, to go by and explore their past.
Orange is unforgiving and approaches subjects such as substance abuse, rape, and domestic violence without holding back, but what amazed me the most was the tenderness and understanding in which Orange writes about the characters.
Not every story is great but the good ones are fantastic, emotional, and highly effective. This fast paced and thought provoking novel reaches its apogee...

France on Apr 03, 2019

Rafael Moscatel: Tommy Orange effectively frames up a narrative that is full of angst, sadness and raw contempt, weaving a series of Native American allegories and historical set pieces that create context for the voices we’re introduced to in the first few chapters. This is a young writer with great potential who almost wrote a great book...

The author, or his characters, are in a sense maimed emotionally, and the prologue attempts to establish this through the use of grotesque imagery of severed hands and heads in whiskey jars and on spikes, haunting reminders of past sins of American settlers which have soaked through the memories of generation after generation like blood through a blanket. It ends up bringing us to present day, or recent history, recounting the Urban Indians born into the modern metropolis with references to recent wars and attempts at assimilation, which are selective of course, representative certainly though of a segment of the population familiar to the writer. In my life I had grown up with Native Americans near Reno Nevada, came to know many of them quite well, and they were not at all as consumed with the melancholy which is richly described throughout his...

United States on Jan 26, 2019