Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward Summary

Sing, Unburied, Sing is a 2017 novel that follows 13-year-old JoJo and his toddler sister Kayla living with their grandparents in rural Mississippi while their drug-addicted mother Leonie emotionally abandons them. When the family travels to Parchman Prison to pick up JoJo's white father Michael, JoJo encounters the ghost of Richie, a young boy who died at the prison decades earlier, revealing the long legacy of racism, violence, and incarceration that haunts their community.

Jesmyn Ward is an American novelist and professor at Tulane University who made history as the first woman and first Black American to win the National Book Award for Fiction twice—in 2011 for Salvage the Bones and 2017 for Sing, Unburied, Sing. Born in 1977, Ward received her MFA from the University of Michigan and a MacArthur "Genius Grant" in 2017. Her lyrical prose explores the lives of poor African Americans in coastal Mississippi with unflinching honesty.

Sing, Unburied, Sing is ideal for readers of literary fiction who appreciate character-driven narratives, poetic language, and explorations of race, poverty, and family dysfunction in the American South. This book suits those willing to engage with difficult themes including racism, addiction, and generational trauma, as well as readers interested in magical realism and books compared to Toni Morrison's Beloved. It's not recommended for those seeking plot-heavy narratives or clear-cut resolutions.

Sing, Unburied, Sing is absolutely worth reading, having won the 2017 National Book Award, appeared on President Obama's 2017 reading list, and ranked #30 on The New York Times' best books of the 21st century. Despite some critiques about narrative voice consistency, the novel's powerful exploration of racism, family bonds, and intergenerational trauma through Ward's luminous prose makes it essential contemporary American literature. Time and The New York Times both named it one of 2017's top ten novels.

Sing, Unburied, Sing explores racism and white supremacy through the brutal history of Parchman Prison and the present-day racial profiling experienced by biracial children JoJo and Kayla. The novel examines family dysfunction and addiction, particularly how Leonie's drug use forces JoJo to parent his younger sister. Other central themes include death and mercy, the lasting trauma of violence, the resilience of familial bonds, and how poverty and incarceration perpetuate cycles of oppression in Black communities.

The ghosts in Sing, Unburied, Sing represent unresolved trauma and historical injustices that continue haunting the present, particularly the ghost of Richie who died at Parchman Prison in the 1940s. Rather than purely supernatural elements, these spirits symbolize how violent deaths—especially those caused by racism—chain souls to earth and prevent healing across generations. JoJo's ability to communicate with these spirits reveals how past atrocities remain embedded in the lives of contemporary Black families in Mississippi.

Sing, Unburied, Sing echoes Toni Morrison's Beloved through its use of magical realism, incorporation of ghosts representing historical trauma, and unflinching examination of racism's devastating impact on Black families. Both novels feature supernatural elements rooted in real violence—slavery in Beloved, Jim Crow-era prison brutality in Ward's work—and explore how the dead remain present in the lives of the living. Critics position Jesmyn Ward as following in Morrison's footsteps as a literary giant documenting African American experiences.

Parchman Prison, officially the Mississippi State Penitentiary, serves as a central symbol in Sing, Unburied, Sing representing the long history of oppression faced by Black communities in Mississippi. The prison haunts multiple generations of JoJo's family—his grandfather worked there, his father is incarcerated there, and the ghost of Richie died there in the 1940s. Parchman reveals how the criminal justice system perpetuates racial violence and destroys Black families across decades.

The title Sing, Unburied, Sing refers to the voices of the dead who remain "unburied" because they died violently and unjustly, unable to find peace or move on from their earthly trauma. These spirits must "sing"—tell their stories and be heard—before they can be released from their suffering. The title evokes both the characters' need to give voice to forgotten victims of racism and the lyrical, song-like quality of Jesmyn Ward's prose throughout the novel.

The primary criticism of Sing, Unburied, Sing concerns the unrealistic narrative voices of 13-year-old JoJo and drug-addicted Leonie, whose internal monologues are far too complex, nuanced, and poetic for their ages and educational backgrounds. Reviewers noted the stark contrast between characters' colloquial dialogue and their extraordinarily introspective thoughts, making it feel like Stanford-educated Ward's voice rather than authentic Mississippi characters. A third-person perspective would have made the lyrical prose more plausible.

JoJo and Kayla share a heartening, unbreakable sibling bond formed in response to their mother Leonie's emotional abandonment and drug addiction. As a 13-year-old forced into a parental role, JoJo protects and nurtures his toddler sister Kayla with profound tenderness throughout their difficult family circumstances. Their relationship represents resilience and love emerging from loss, demonstrating how children create their own support systems when parents fail them.

Sing, Unburied, Sing remains urgently relevant in 2025 because it addresses ongoing systemic racism, mass incarceration of Black Americans, and intergenerational trauma that continue plaguing communities today. The novel's exploration of how addiction and poverty destroy families, racial profiling persists, and historical violence echoes into the present resonates with contemporary social justice movements and conversations about criminal justice reform. Ward's unflinching portrayal of these issues offers essential perspective on America's unresolved racial wounds.