The Unsettled

Praise

“Ten years after The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, Mathis again strikes story-telling gold.” –People

“An ardent, ambitious, and carefully stitched tapestry of a novel, one that deserves and rewards our attention.” –The Minneapolis Star Tribune

“A decade after taking the world by storm with her debut novel, The Twelve Tribes of Hattie—the 72nd Oprah’s Book Club selection and an instant bestseller—Mathis is back with a highly anticipated and emotionally propulsive follow-up . . . Through a chorus of distinctive and virtuosic voices, we gather the story of a mother, a daughter, and the land that both unites and divides them.” – Oprah Daily

“Shelter without the grace of welcome is exposure to the worst coldness of the world. Loyalty and the offer of comfort satisfy needs we feel in our bones.  In The Unsettled, Ayana Mathis brings these extremes of experience intensely to life. This is a fine, powerful book.” – Marilynne Robinson, author of Gilead

“The Unsettled crosses generations and landscapes, digs in the Southern soil and walks mean Northern city streets. Expansive and explosive, this beauty of a novel showcases Ayana Mathis’s grace on the page, as writer, as storyteller. A book to be read and re-read.” – Jesmyn Ward, author of Let Us Descend

“Ayana Mathis is one of the most brilliant writers working in today’s America. A tour de force, The Unsettled is a poetic and fierce study of the conflicts between circumstances and personalities, between dreams and survivals, between the indifference of the world at large and the passions of individuals.” – Yiyun Li, author of The Book of Goose

“Another triumph for Mathis . . . Fresh, bold, entrancing  . . . [The Unsettled] sparkles even as it cuts to the bone.” –Library Journal (starred review)

“An affecting and carefully drawn story of a family on the brink . . . Mathis powerfully evokes the heartbreak and ways best efforts are undermined by social and legal machinery.” – Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“A simmering family saga involving fraught efforts in building Black communities . . . Mathis ratchets up the tension all the way to a stunning reveal, which reunites the family members for a reckoning with the truth. Readers won’t want to miss Mathis’s accomplished return.” – Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Surprising and gorgeous . . . Mathis’ long-awaited sophomore novel leaves the Great Migration of her lauded debut (The Twelve Tribes of Hattie) for the 1980s, but her sharp characters, vivid settings, and beautiful sentences remain . . . Hattie fans will not be disappointed.” – Booklist