The Kindest Lie by Nancy Johnson
Pages: 336
Published by William Morrow
Publication Date February 2, 2021
Date Read May 23, 2023
Genres: Contemporary Fiction
Format: Physical Book
Goodreads
A promise could betray you.
It’s 2008, and the inauguration of President Barack Obama ushers in a new kind of hope. In Chicago, Ruth Tuttle, an Ivy-League educated Black engineer, is married to a kind and successful man. He’s eager to start a family, but Ruth is uncertain. She has never gotten over the baby she gave birth to—and was forced to leave behind—when she was a teenager. She had promised her family she’d never look back, but Ruth knows that to move forward, she must make peace with the past.
Returning home, Ruth discovers the Indiana factory town of her youth is plagued by unemployment, racism, and despair. As she begins digging into the past, she unexpectedly befriends Midnight, a young white boy who is also adrift and looking for connection. Just as Ruth is about to uncover a burning secret her family desperately wants to keep hidden, a traumatic incident strains the town’s already searing racial tensions, sending Ruth and Midnight on a collision course that could upend both their lives.
Powerful and revealing, The Kindest Lie captures the heartbreaking divide between Black and white communities and offers both an unflinching view of motherhood in contemporary America and the never-ending quest to achieve the American Dream.
Reviews Done Quick
The Kindest Lie centers around Ruth. After many years she is returning home for the holidays. However, something else draws her home. Ruth had a baby in high school, and now in her thirties, she feels pulled to find him. The Kindest Lie while a good holiday read, was a little predictable and dragged in places. I found the sections about her brother who fell from a small-town basketball star to a drug addict much more interesting. Overall, The Kindest Lie by Nancy Johnson was a nice winter read but nothing to write home about.
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