Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff

  

This took a toll. That's not to say it wasn't good, it was. But as a Black person, it took a toll on me to read this.

Awhile back I was listening to a podcast and one of hosts said that Toni Morrison's Beloved was her favorite horror story. That horror part of that statement struck me as odd at first but then the host talked about the horror of slavery combined with the ghost baby and it all made sense. Lovecraft Country is horror in the same way Beloved is and more so. There's the horror in the form of violence and threats of violence against Black bodies and horror in the form of magical things of unknown origin.

Rather than one story as expected, Lovecraft Country is actually a set of interconnected stories set in the Jim Crow era. The first story has Atticus Turner, a Korean War vet, driving from the southern half of the United States to north. He hollers for joy upon crossing the Mason-Dixon line even though he knows Jim Crow is alive and well in the north too. Atticus relies on The Safe Negro Travel Guide published by his uncle to make his way safely home. Of course, he is never truly safe. Upon reaching home he finds out that his father is missing. Atticus, his Uncle George, and their friend Letitia set out to find Atticus's father. They eventually find him being held captive by the Braithwhite family. The Braithwhite family is one of several White families that hope to harness their supernatural powers and Atticus just happens to be a useful tool, not a person just a tool, in the pursuit. The remaining stories all connect back to the Braithwhite’s quest for power.

Throughout the stories Atticus and family friends have to deal with ordinary racism, which often threatens to get them beaten or killed, as well as ghosts, malevolent spirits, and other supernatural happenings beyond their control. Spoiler, the everyday racism is way scarier than anything supernatural.

There were two short passages that really stuck a chord with me. The first involved books. Atticus is a reader and he especially loves science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Atticus remembers how he and his father used to argue over Atticus’s book selection. The books Atticus tended to pick at best had no non-white characters, or worse had stereotypical racist characters, or maybe it was the author who was known to be a bigot. Atticus realizes this but he likes what he likes and I totally get it. One, it be hard to separate the artist from the work. (It is always a blow to learn that an author you loved as a kid, like say Roald Dahl, was massively anti-Semitic.) Two, things are different now but when I was a kid most of the books that were available to me didn’t have characters that looked like me. As a kid I realized this but just took it at face value. As an adult I can look back and think authors and publishers could have and should have done better, but at the same time I can’t say I dislike all the books I read as a kid. I still like them, although it is hard to recommend some of the books I liked as a kid to kids today.

The second passage involved Ruby and her realization the power she holds as a White woman. Ruby is actually Black but a potion allows her to turn temporarily into a White woman. One day she is upset and a police officer asks her what’s wrong. A little ways away there happen to be some Black teenage boys minding their own business and the police officer asks if the problem is them. Ruby realizes that all it would take for the police hassle those boys (or much worse) is her saying they bothered her. In fact, the officer is ready to go after them before she says anything at all and Ruby has to persuade him that the boys did nothing to her. It’s scary to know that Ruby was right in knowing how vulnerable those boys were.

Bottom line – good read, but a difficult read.