Better late than never with this review of Dig. I put off reading this book after a few false starts, but once I got into it the book had me hooked with its strange structure and mysterious weaving of stories.

Dig by A.S. King is a dark, thought-provoking novel that explores the impact of generational racism, family trauma, and privilege in America. King’s unique style is a bit confusing at first, moving between several characters with names like “The Freak” and “The Shoveler,” each dealing with their own struggles. But as the story unfolds, their lives begin to connect in surprising, meaningful ways.

Though it takes some patience, Dig rewards readers with a powerful, layered story. King weaves themes of hatred and healing with hints of magical realism, creating a novel that’s both unsettling and deeply moving. If you’re up for something unique and challenging, Dig is well worth the read.

A strong and well written novel about race, ethnicity, and class. Really makes you think about what happens around you.

This is the story of five young adults who find their way into each others messed up lives.
Opinion
The acknowledgments for the book mention how awkward this book was supposed to make you. It certainly was a bit crazy and awkward but intriguing. It is like a car accident you are driving by, you just can't help but watch.
The way the book wraps up is interesting. I saw part of it coming but was a bit amazed at the whole ending.
This book would be a good book to rock kids worlds and make them look within themselves.
Many thanks to Net Galley and Penguin Books for providing me with an ARC of this book (and many apologies that it took me so long to read the book.)

Such a beautifully written story. I usually struggle with multiple POVs but AS King manages to give each narrator their own distinct voice and seeing how each character's life is interwoven with the other is heartbreaking but also such a realistic portrayal of life in a world set up for white people. I will most definitely recommend this to other people.

A. S. King is amazing! She has written another masterpiece that portrays young adults, and their problems, so accurately. While I was very confused for the first quarter of the book, it did start making sense the further I got into it and she really wraps things up by the end. "Dig" is about 5 estranged cousins and the lives they are leading. There are some supernatural elements, so don't go in thinking that this is realistic fiction. I would highly recommend this read!

I love a good label as much as I love a good title and this book delivers on both those things. It's riddled with social commentary, this book explores the injustice of labels AND gives the characters labels that scythe through social expectations. And the digs keep coming.

This is a multi-generational level story and contains a sorted family tree and complicated familiar relationships.

The drama is like a train wreck - you want to look away and keep moving, but you can't help but stay and watch all the carnage unfold. The failures are spectacular.

Meet the main cast: The Shoveler, the freak, CanIHelpYou?, Loretta (Flea Circus Ring Master), and first-class Malcolm. They all have something in common, but you'll have to dig deep into the novel to find out what it is. This novel had me turning pages until the end to uncover the mystery! The novel tells the stories from different points of view and different tenses (first and third person) depending on the character and it matches each character perfectly.

The best part - they don't even know how their lives are all connected and interwoven until the end. I like the different chapters that focus on different characters and how the connections and narratives are slowly unearthed. It's a very well-written plot that makes my heart happy while the razor sharp social criticism makes my head happy.

The part that stuck with me the most: the inherent racism of believing that if you received colored blood during a blood transfusion that somehow it taints the blood and makes the receiver part colored. That blew my mind. I researched it after I finished the novel and it was a common belief. I had no idea.

This book made me uncomfortable in all the right ways and made me re-evaluate my life and how I teach. After all, isn't that the point of a good novel? It gets to you on many different levels.

This YA book that should be read by adults as well. It is so timely and relevent. The story deals with serious topics. Racism and the generational progression aare woven through the entire book. Some sections were a bit confusing until I slowed down to re-read. Then the connections started to click.
I have found with A. S. King books, They aren't straightforward narratives that walk up and say "Here's your story and here's the lesson you should take from it."

4 Stars

A.S. King did it again, i always start one of her books knowing I’m going to be confused for a while, there’s going to be many types of social commentary that I won’t understand until later, and that I will love all the characters in different ways by the end. And yes, that I will be so glad i read the book. All those came true in this book. I loved the twist with the Freak, their interconnected ness and the obvious dysfunction of every one of Marla and Gottfried’s children and grandchildren. I hope they all make it out of the tunnel and above ground.

This is a timely YA work that should be read by adults as well. The author creates a story that deals with serious topics. Racism and the generational progression weaves itself through the pages. At times, I was re-reading sections for clarification and to make connections. This, however, did not distract from the overall story but was my own preference.

Though I really wanted to like this book, it took way too long to put all the pieces together of the myriad of viewpoints to figure out what was really going on. I'm not a fan of multiple POV stories, especially in a YA novel when there are adult voices also telling the story (the grandparents). While the topic was interesting - the systemic racism that is learned through generations - I couldn't get into the story as it was and it dragged for me.

“Dysfunction on steroids.” That’s how I walked away after reading Dig by A.S. King. This book was heavy, filled with secrets, abuse, drugs, illness (mental and physical), violence, racism, poverty, abandonment. The cast of characters include Loretta the Flea Circus Ringmaster who uses this unorthodox method for coping with an abusive father. The Shoveler, uprooted too many times by a shoplifting mother, suffers from identity issues because he doesn’t know who his father is. “Can I Help You” is a defiant teen who sells drugs at the drive-thru window of her fast food restaurant, purposely fails in school, and is best friends with a black boy to spite her racist mother. Malcolm’s father is dying of cancer and he wants to control his future, but everyone is trying to make the decisions for him. The Freak is angry and has been on the run for two years. Jake and Bill are brothers whose relationship is controlled by a huge secret. Everyone’s lives are affected by their past or their families or their relationships. No one is being nurtured. And all are digging for their truth, for their survival. Digging to survive. And they are all connected in some way to the wealthy married couple Marla and Gottfried whose private demons affect their relationship with each other as well as their relationship with their adult children.

I must admit, I almost didn’t finish reading the book. Not only was every character’s story so heavy, It was just one sad page after another. The dysfunction in their lives was very overwhelming. Then there was the mysteriousness of The Freak character that had me confused at first. And to add to all of that, I just didn’t get the connections between the stories and the characters. They all seemed so random. I reread the summary of the book to make sure that I was reading the right book wondering what did all this have to do with Easter dinner and some cousins reuniting. If I had written this review having read only half the book, this would be an entirely different review--mostly negative and warning people against it. But, having read the entire book--I get it. I get the complexity needed and the purpose for the silos created in the individual stories. It paints a picture of just how dysfunctional the family was. It also lends to the symbolism of the potato plant which comes from previously harvested potatoes, This is what ties everyone together.

I ended up really liking the book and would recommend it to others with the warning to stick with it and look for the little hints dropped throughout. What also kept me from giving this 5 out of 5 stars is the author's tendency to get preachy at times, especially when it came to "white privilege" and "racism" Rather than showing it, these parts came of as telling it.

Full review on goodreads. Such a heavy book that was so confusing to start, with characters and a storyline I struggled to keep straight and make sense of. Then when it all came together, it was so good. Worth the wait.

You have to read this book from cover to cover to fully understand and even realize what the heck is going on. There are parts early on in Dig that the reader will not initially understand in the bigger picture and that, standing on their own, may seem completely neither here nor there. As the story unfolds, the numerous storylines, told from the point of view of five cousins who either have little or no idea they are related, come together in a dysfunctional family Easter reunion of sorts.

I am a huge fan of A.S. King. King's novels always tackle serious issues in the most interesting way. In Dig, King examines the toxicity of white supremacy and racism amid generations of a really messed up family. This book will certainly not be for everyone, but those who "get it" will absolutely love it!

Thanks to Netgalley for the arc.

After reading this in an ARC ebook format, I feel like I might have been able to follow the story better if I'd had a hard copy in my hands. It was just a little hard to follow with the awkward spacing, so I do plan to reread once I purchase a copy.

Overall, the reason I wanted to finish the book was to find out how the strange pieces of the story fit together. It is told in such a way that you know there are connections between the characters, but you aren't sure exactly how they relate. There was definitely satisfaction in following the threads to the end.

One reason I found this story difficult to swallow was the similarity to my own extended family's dysfunction. Seeing how racism and bias in general is passed down through generations made so much sense.

Dig introduces five estranged cousins, whose dysfunctional family includes wealthy grandparents Marla and Gottfried Hemmings, who have left their 5 children and teenage grandchildren to flounder in various state of illness and poverty. David-The Shoveler, Katie-CanIHelpYou?, Loretta-Flea Circus Ring Mistress, First-Class Malcom, and the Freak are brought together by tragedy. Trauma and abuse cause the teens to find security in their self-defined roles. David, who frequently moves with his mother, carries a snow shovel to protect himself from bullies, Katie works at Arby's where she deals drugs from the drive-through window. Loretta finds solace in a family of fleas she carries in a lunchbox, as she struggles with her violent father's abuse. Malcom takes frequent first-class flights to Jamaica with his widower father, who is batting cancer. The Freak appears supernaturally between locations, checking in on her cousins and trying to help. The narrative deals with the issues of racism, white power and privilege and class as the teens' stories are revealed and come together. Can this generation of Hemmings dig its way out of the toxic environment that their grandparents created?

Five teenagers' lives intersect repeatedly throughout this story written in vignettes. The adults in the story are dysfunctional and socially stifled by racism, judgement, finances, illness, and mental health issues. Gottfried and Marla Hemmings are the link shared by the teenagers and the adults.

At first the vignettes gave me the impressions that I was reading a play. The teenagers' nicknames also didn't sit well with me at the beginning. Once the characters' lives begin to intersect the nicknames and the vignette make a lot of sense.

The author brilliantly points out that adults are so busy being wrapped up in their lives and knowing best that they do not listen to their observant children who are not yet blind to life's more important issues.

Thank you #duttonbooksforyoungreaders, @as_king_ and @netgalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book ASTOUNDED me. I'd never heard of A. S. King (huge oversight, clearly), but I'm going to read all of her books after this. The deft way King illustrated both the insidious as well as the overt evils of white supremacy and racism (and patriarchy) took me aback, particularly as this is YA (though this is a book that adults--particularly white adults-- NEED to read as well). It's snarkily funny at times, but it will also make you rage and make you cry (at least it did for me). The characters are all amazingly developed, and the narrative conceits, while initially avant-garde-seeming, quickly make sense. The fantastical/magical element of the book adds a level of seeming whimsy to the book that eventually translates into a poignant mystery that absolutely crushed me. I fucking loved this book. I cannot wait to teach it one day. (Thanks to NetGalley for the decidedly not-in-advance readers copy.)

I really loved this book. The way King pulled together all the various storylines and characters was masterful! I feel like this book deals with a lot of serious themes like assault and cancer, but I think this book would still be a really powerful read for a teen who is ready for it. I will be buying a copy to put in my classroom library!

This was a tricky book to read and review, for my students while they would probably learn from it and relate to it, there was too much stuff as an educator i can't promote. The consciousness about racism and class made it worth reading. I struggled with it but did eventually get involved in the different stories and found it worthwhile by the end. It did feel repetitive for parts of the middle and one or two of the characters stories didn't make a lot of sense

I was given a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Books for the digital copy of Dig by A.S. King.

This book has a large cast of characters with elements of magical realism.

This novel is about a family of potato farmers. It follows a group of cousins and their coming to together throughout the length of the novel. It depicts them and their grandparents who have decided not to pass down their inheritance because they have different hopes for their grandchildren.

There is commentary on classism, privilege, and racism.