"The Great Wherever" review: A ghost story exploring African American land ownership and generational struggle in the US South
A review of Shannon Sanders' novel "The Great Wherever," which uses ghosts and supernatural elements to explore the history of African American land ownership in the US South. The story follows the Lamb family who, in the 1930s, purchase the land on which they were once enslaved, and their multi-generational struggle to hold onto it. The novel is set in rural Tennessee and Washington DC, using ghosts as a narrative device to bridge family silences and reclaim lost time.
Key quotes
Time dilates for young children, Shannon Sanders writes in The Great Wherever, and also for ghosts.
Ghosts can reclaim time in which to grieve, gossip and watch their earthly relatives in horror, pity and love.
Sometimes the dead can bridge silences in family lineage too.
Ghosts have always been more than mysterious spectres in African American culture and in this novel a plot of land connects the living and the dead in surreal and unexpected ways.
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