Finally finshed this, here's my review.
Tayara Jones' demonstrates a bleak view of the black community. A community in which the women are good cooks, moody and strong willed, the men are pathetic and weak and at the complete disposal of the women and all the white people are bad.
If only she made Celestial an interesting character one could understand why Roy went to all this trouble. Jones tries to with the weird puppets arc - a 50 dollar puppet that makes the buyer uncomfortable - but Celestial never becomes more than a woman who wants it all but isn't prepared to make sacrifices. Throughout the novel, one one learns anything. A lot is going on but not one of the characters learns anything from it or changes their standpoint.
The main characters make very odd choices and hold questionable views. For example, when Roy gets back with Celestial for a night and he is adamant on having unprotected sex because apparently condoms are out of line if you're married - most odd - but he simply forgets that just a week ago he had unprotected sex with the first woman he ran in to. Or when Celestial tells Roy's mother about Walter, which was completely out of line. She later gives a half arsed explanation about how his mother found peace then but that doesn't change the fact that it was rude and not hers to tell. It's one of the many many instances in the book when a character should have noticed his or her mistake and apologize for it but that never happens.
The writing isn't very good. Jones uses every Cosmopolitan/US Weekly cliche about women and their (sexual) healing powers she knows. Her "wisdom" is pedestrian and as RS mentioned very chic lit. It's no wonder Oprah and her mumsnet brigade lap it up. Jones plays on the readers emotions and doesn't leave much room for interpretation. The using of first names for the parents was also very annoying.
There is some very subtle black vs white racism going on if you read between the lines. Every white character is vilified - from the rape victim to the judge, everyone is bad - which at itself isn't a crime necessarily, but she fails to give a single explanation for that. Some more detail about the court proceedings would have been needed before basically stating that black people cannot get an honest trial. Also there's a complete story line about the rape victim that is lost that could have been fascinating, but no. We get predictable prison letters and an over the top fight with Andre who has just been written in the book to play the victim to Roy's dominance over Celestial instead.
This was not a great novel. I struggled to finish it because there's nothing to take away from it. I would rate it 1.5/5.