Sky Full of Elephants by Cebo Campbell
Charlie is a college professor recently released from prison. He embarks on a road trip with his daughter, who he has never met. They are in an America where there are no white people. This book mixes science fiction and magical realism, forcing the reader to ask various questions. It explores black identity, culture, and self-discovery.
Where to Find Reviews
🥰 Who Would Like It?
This is a hard book to recommend. It can be uncomfortable, and it is different.
Highlights and Notes
"I suppose anything sounds righteous when you pay it enough respect." (Page 5)
So much life and so much energy. Easy to forget that half the world died. But then again, Charlie noted, neither grief nor calamity had ever stopped the joy of black people. We smiled through the worst the world had to offer, he thought. Smiled even when our lips bled. (Page 6)
And fail they did. Too sudden did America fall into hands unprepared to hold its bounty. Too few knew how to fish. Too few could skin a buck. Too few understood how to run a farm, or the mechanics of a clock, or the variable shapes of government. Only a fragile structure remained, consequently, without the reinforcement of porcelain beams, ultimately punctuating precisely whod made that system and kept charge of its maintenance. (Page 7)
Charlie had seen other ethnicities after the event, but rarely and in too few numbers to not have been diminished in some way by whatever took the others. No, the rules weren't so black and white. Only then did that fact sting Charlie. Because if it was identity that killed all those people, who then was his daughter? Charlie had contributed nothing to her identity, wasn't so sure he ever had anything worth being offered, yet on this earth she remained, same as him. (Page 21)
He wondered if this was what Columbus felt: to look upon something already there with nothing to stop you from claiming every mile as yours. (Page 23)
"Charles, it's okay to be two things at once. Every day that a tree is growing, it's dying at the same time. If it can do that, then a very sad thing can also give you release. (Page 29)
After that dinner, his mother told him being black is being the villain in someone else's story. (Page 61)
Sidney's heart had no preparation for the feeling that stirred within: protected, by a force the world and everything in it taught her to fear. (Page 72)
We finally got the world to ourselves, and we still just continuing on with the program they made for us. I expected us to make something new. Something nobody's ever seen before. But all we do is become the best version of what they wanted us to be. The patriarchy didn't walk into that water, but I sometimes wish it did too. (Page 90)
"My God, you killed them. You turned on that machine and it started the event." "That's what happened." "You killed all those people." "I didn't kill them. We did. All of us. All through time. Everything they'd ever done to us was pent up, and it just poured out. It had to. 1 didn't choose to have what happened to them come to pass. I just chose us. To heal us. And healing us meant reconciling all of that shit, you hear me? That's the only decision I made. When no one else would, I chose us!" (Page 205)
"This machine destroyed the world. I can't be a part of that." "You already are a part of it. And this signal didn't destroy a world or a people. It destroyed an idea. The very idea and the lies it spun that had warped our sense of self into something you couldn't even recognize. The machine destroyed an idea, Charlie. And in so doing, it took all the people who clung to that idea as fact. All I did was tune in to what was already there—the signal of us hovering in the air." (Page 206)
We are not all gone, Agnes's note had said. The we she meant and the we Sidney saw arrived upon her with as much surprise as relief. People, she saw. Every shade of yellow, beige, red, brown, in a spectrum of colors in between extremes. White was an identity independent of color, and it lived out on Orange Beach. (Page 228)
🧠Thoughts
Initial Thoughts
- Chapter 1 starts with Charlie. He has recently been released from prison and is teaching at Howard. He seems very introspective and trying to figure out who he is. Then he gets a call from his daughter, who seems he has never met.
- Chapter 2 introduces Sidney and gives background on the day her brothers, mom, and stepdad walked into the lake. It’s emotional. I felt her desperation. Her fear. He loss.
Last Thought
- Wow. I have so many mixed feelings regarding this book. Some aspects were powerful, and others missed the mark. It is a great book club pick because the discussion would be very lively.
Characters
- Charlie
- black man recently released from prison
- professor at Howard
- Sidney
- mixed-raced daughter of Charlie
- spent the last year in isolation and is traumatized by the death of her family
- not a likable character and her resolution felt out of place to most of her arc throughout the book
- Ruling class of Kingdom of Alabama
- functions as a monarchy
- I don't feel like we spent much time with them, so besides an innate understanding of their expressed tiredness, the book did not do a good job of characterizing them
- not sure how i feel about women's characterization in this book
Conflict
- Charlie vs Sidney. Sidney did not like her father and made it known. The book's first half focuses on them existing together and trying to overcome her anger. The second half of the book got away from that.
- Identity. All the characters have to figure out who they are without white people around and their connection to whiteness.
- The Event. What happens to white people is a mystery throughout the story.
Context
- Dystopian in the first half and utopia in the second half.
- The world left some holes.
Craft
- Mix bag
- there seems to be too many messages in the story so they all get weakened
- the first half and second half of the book seem to have a tonal shift
Interesting Thoughts
- great book club pick
- has some hotep vibes but great book for black men