The Water Dance by Ta-Nehisi Coates

very slow beginning but gave it the benefit of my the doubt, because I enjoyed Coates non-fiction books so much.

But ultimately, closed the books after getting not even halfway through. He writes beautifully and grandly, but core elements of fiction -- distinctive characters, a compelling plot line -- are missing.

Coates seems to assume we are familiar with all of the usual stuff of slave narratives, and that he doesn't have to re-hash that. But the mystery at the core of the book -- what magical powers the narrator possess -- had still not been clear to me by page 150, and I have up trying to care.