This beautifully crafted novel tells the story of Hiram, one of the "tasked" in Virginia who is educated for the purpose of being a manservant to his half-brother -- his father's white son and heir to the plantation. The story is compelling and as a reader I found myself very invested in Hiram's future. The magical realism elements of the story are woven into the narrative and provide a way for readers to better understand the violations and losses inflicted on slaves.

The setting of this book was absolutely impeccable. I haven't read many novels about slavery in America (I'm Canadian, so it's not a huge part of our school curriculum or an aspect of history I personally studied), but this book is definitely an excellent exploration of that time period. Nothing is overly explained, but there is very clear imagery about how status and race works. I loved Hiram's perspective on the Tasked (slaves) and Quality (the high-born whites who own slaves), and Hiram himself is a sympathetic and bright narrator, if sometimes naive or overly wishful.

That said, I sometimes stumbled upon the narration and prose. Coates can write beautifully, and there were many passages I found incredibly well-written - ideas about slavery and human nature laid bare in such devastating clarity. But there were simultaneously points that just lost me in the narrative, making me go back to reread in order to understand what was happening. The aspects of magical realism were also a bit lost on me; magical realism can be a hit or miss, and I don't quite think I connected with it here.

I am putting the book aside at about 60%, but with the hope of returning to it again in the future.

I have read and enjoyed Mr. Coates’s essays for years. He is a powerful thinker and writer. Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for sending me an ARC of Mr. Coates’s first novel in exchange for an honest review.

The Water Dancer tells the story of Hiram, a slave (or a “Tasked”) who is the son of Rose, a slave, and her owner Howell Walker, the Master of Lockless, a slowly failing tobacco plantation in Virginia. Hiram has no memories of his mother, who was sold away years before the book opens. After an accident kills Maynard Walker, Howell’s legitimate son and Hiram’s half-brother, Hiram discovers he has a special power. Following Maynard’s death, Hiram escapes Virginia, joins the Underground, and eventually realizes what is most important to him, and how he wants to use his power and live his life.

Your mileage may vary on Hiram’s power, later labeled “conduction.” It is a bit of magical realism, and is pivotal to the plot. I got used to it as the story progressed, but I never quite got comfortable with it. I would also say it made the first chapter, which was a small flash forward where you are dropped into the scene of Maynard’s death, especially confusing.

Still, the writing is impeccable and evocative, sometimes grand and other times intimate. The themes raised within the story are familiar to a regular reader of Coates. The staggering accumulation of wealth permitted by slavery. The powerful importance of family history and stories. And that poor whites should be economically allied with blacks but were instead: “a degraded and downtrodden nation who endured the boot of the Quality, solely for the right to put a boot of their own to the Tasked.... [f]or all of us were low, we were all tasked, and we should be in union and arrayed against the Quality, if only the low whites would wager their crumbs for a slice of the whole cake.” Most of all, in a way I have not experienced before, The Water Dancer dramatizes the deliberate slavery-era plan of breaking up black families to keep slaves weak and disorganized, and illustrates the profound effects such cruelty had on those family members.

I expect Mr. Coates will reach a new audience with this novel. Hopefully some of those new readers will be motivated to seek out his other writings, especially The Case for Reparations. Highly recommended.

Whoa what a journey! This book is definitely going to be making headlines and bestseller lists when it comes out. Hiram's story was heartbreaking and captivating at the same time. Coates' writing is beautiful and I do not know how he was able to convey a slaves life the way he did. I definitely will recommend this book to everyone.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this wonderful book .

This is not an easy book to read. Narrated by Hiram, the main character, a slave born to the white male owner of the plantation, Lockless and Rose, his slave mother. The author takes the reader into the life of the slave and tells us their fears, the longing of family and the every day struggles. It's not easy to read as you become involved in their lives and feel for them and the injustice of how slaves were treated and torn from their families.
Their hope comes from the Underground Railway and Ta-Nehisi Coates takes you there. As the reader, you see how hard it is to walk away from the only place you know and run toward freedom and a new way of life. The twist is the ability which Hiram and a few others are able to help others escape through Conduction.
It's beautifully written. The hope and help of those fighting for their freedom will never be forgotten.

This is the first book that I have read by this author and it will not be the last. This is a beautifully written story about a brutal time in history.

Very well done and these characters will stay with me for a very long time.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Random House for this advanced readers copy. The release date for this book is set for September 2019.

An amazing treat to read, with the words flowing like leaves on a river. I think I was more captivated by the worss themselves than the story. However the story was steller as well and I can't wait to reread.

I was immediately intrigued about 'The Water Dancer,' knowing how popular Ta-Nehisi Coates's last book was. The book began a little slow, but language and writing style is what kept me going- it was beautiful.

The book focuses on a young boy and his experience in slavery, as well as losing his mother. The topics are difficult to read, but necessary to understand the conditions for a large population of people within our history.

This is Coates's first novel, and I will look forward to anything else he writes. His writing was beautiful, as was the thread of magical realism drawn throughout. I have read a lot of books about slavery in the past, and the genre is not my favorite, nor is historical fiction, but it was definitely worth a read.

I've known for years that Coates can write great nonfiction, and it turns out he writes fiction that is equally insightful and precise. Every sentence is a gem, so I had the pleasure of slowing down my reading to savor each one. Coates uses a sci-fi mechanism to explore life under slavery. Breaking the rules of our "known" world was a risky choice, in that it could have made the issue of slavery feel distant. Instead, his imaginative moves add to the vividness of the reader's experience. This book will make you think. It will make you feel. No matter who you are, it will teach you. I highly recommend this for individual reading and for book groups.

In his boldly imagined first novel, Ta-Nehisi Coates, the National Book Award–winning author of Between the World and Me, brings home the most intimate evil of enslavement: the cleaving and separation of families.

This is the dramatic story of an atrocity inflicted on generations of women, men, and children—the violent and capricious separation of families—and the war they waged to simply make lives with the people they loved. Written by one of today's most exciting thinkers and writers, The Water Dancer is a propulsive, transcendent work that restores the humanity of those from whom everything was stolen.

This is the dramatic story of an atrocity inflicted on generations of women, men, and children—the violent and capricious separation of families—and the war they waged to simply make lives with the people they loved. Written by one of today's most exciting thinkers and writers, The Water Dancer is a propulsive, transcendent work that restores the humanity of those from whom everything was stolen.

A thoughtful and powerful story about the rise of the Underground Railroad and the decline of the Virginia plantations. A beautifully written story infused with the power of memory to transport. A great read.

“Slavery was the root of all struggle.”

Hiram Walker was born a slave on a Virginia plantation. Through this book, we follow the struggles of his journey growing up and his fight for freedom. This novel speaks to what a powerful and gifted storyteller the author is. The writing was beautiful and complex, and I really had to take my time to fully grasp all that was being said as each word was with purpose. I loved the development of characters and unfolding of the storyline. A good reminder of all the atrocities that occurred in times past, The Water Dancer was a touch magical and very remarkable.

Thank you to Random House Publishing and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.

This is a beautifully written book contrasting mans inhumanity to man through slavery and the love and selflessness of many to fight this in secret. Hiram Walker, is an intelligent slave boy with an amazing memory. His mother is a slave who is sold away from him when he is a young child. His father is the master of the plantation. Through his experiences, the reader learns of the horrific treatment of slaves but also the lives they lead in their private slave community.

Hiram decides to runaway and though he initially fails, he ultimately is inducted into the secret Underground helping slaves to escape. It is fascinating to understand the strategy and capabilities of different components of the Underground movement. Hiram has special powers which he must learn to use in order to help those he loves. Their is some of magical realism in this book but it flows so well.

I highly recommend this book. and truly enjoyed it.

Hiram was born into slavery. And although he was robbed of the chance to know his mother, she left him a great gift. It's a power that he struggles to understand, but when he joins the Underground Railroad, he learns how valuable it truly is. This is a haunting tale of memory, family, and the lasting damage done by slavery.

This is such a powerful story, and the "Conduction" element of the story is a really interesting and unique mechanism. Honestly, I prefer Coates' non-fiction. Some of the dialogue and pacing were tough for me here. But overall, a very unique and interesting take on slavery and shared memory.

Coates is the kind of writer who changes the way you view both language and the world. This novel is no exception. I can't wait for it to hit shelves and find readers.

They told him he was family. They told him to watch over his brother and gave him nicer clothes, manners and filled his head with knowledge. But what they gave, they took away more - his real family and his memory of her. This beautifully constructed and written book is a song of slavery itself - the brutality, the brainwashing and worst of all the stripping of all humanity until only an obedient husk remains. Hiram Walker has the gift of visions and power but it has been beaten down so often by the Quality that the Tasked cannot hope to fill up what has been taken. It will take an amazing journey and a reawakening in a new Northern world and that of the Underground to fully understand what he has lost and what he can now give to others. Ta-Nehisi Coates shares this story in many ways - a quiet whisper, an anguished cry, and gut-wrenching sob and it is the most powerful voice you will hear this year. My thanks to the publisher for the advance copy.

The existence of the Underground Railroad from the South to the North during the 1800’s has always been mysterious. While such a dangerous pathway to freedom for slaves clearly existed, there appears to be a great deal of romantic mysticism that swirls around this part of history that, unfortunately, is not even alluded to in classrooms. In an interweaving of fact and fantasy reminiscent of Colin Whitehead’s novel, this is the often brutal and occasionally magical tale of Hiram and his induction into the machinations of the Underground. Hiram’s experiences are detailed in depth, sometimes making the story longer and less impactful. Despite this, I feel as though I have been given another glimpse into a culture which - like the Underground Railroad - carries a plethora of rich and multi-faceted facts and fantasy, truth and myths which have not been shared before.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an arc for review. This has not influenced my opinion.
I loved Between the World and Me, and was thrilled to hear that Coates was writing a novel, however, the magical realism aspect of the novel ended up leaving me cold. I enjoyed the exploration of slavery through the eyes of Hiram, an enslaved man, from both the fields and the house - not just from the dual tasking perspectives but because it wasn't the usual white saviour drivel.
I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys both historical fiction and magical realism - if you don't like magical realism, I doubt this will be for you.

I enjoyed this debut novel from Ta-Nehisi Coates. I am very familiar with his essays and nonfiction work and was very much looking forward to his fiction and it did not disappoint. Yes, it is historical fiction (with some twists) but it is never dry or boring. I really enjoyed how he played with what it means to be "owned" and "tasked" and how sometimes freedom isn't really so free. Sometimes you free yourself from one situation, just to be trapped in another. I did think the beginning was a little slow and I had trouble really getting into it at first, but once I hit the 25% mark the book really took off for me and I found it very engrossing.

If you've read his non fiction than you know what a powerfully this author writes. I was so curious about his first first foray into fiction. Would it be as good, as powerful? For me the answer is yes.

This is a vividly portrayed and imaginative slave narrative. It takes place mostly in Virginia at a plantation called Lockless. Hiram is our narrator, he remembers little of his mother and he is the black son of the plantation owner. He also possesses a remarkable memory, and another unusual talent, which I will not explain in this review. The life and brutality of the slave life is powerfully portrayed, the daily losses, the death of self.

The slaves are called the tasked, and they yearn for connection, for freedom. Freedom takes an unusual turn here, and a little magical realism or substitution is employed. The characters, so many, even some of the quality are involved in the intense struggle for freedom. He also doesn't forget to mention all the disenfranchised, those yearning for a freedom not willing not given to them.

A truly remarkable first novel, wonderful characters, steady pacing and s little something different that sets it apart.

ARC from Netgalley.