An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

The book consists largely, but not solely of reading someone else’s private letters, which feels as intrusive as spying on them through an open window. The letters also provide hints into the relationship between the two people, and digging into a whole trove of letters sent over the course of several years can reveal intricacies that face-to-face interaction with the authors never would.
The book follows the wrongful imprisonment of a young black man named Roy, and its impact on him and on his new wife Celestial. There is a third narrator, Andre, a childhood friend of Celestial’s and a college friend of Roy’s. The variation in these perspectives serves an important purpose: It offers up myriad means of understanding the novel’s complicated central relationship, and lets every character speak for themselves.  Celestial is faithful to Roy at first but her devotion to a man she barely knows wanes over time.  Her father, who was very lukewarm on her marriage to Roy, is furious at her for abandoning him when he was incarcerated for being black.  The book is beautifully written and gives the reader a glimmer into the realities of life for people of color in America.