RaveDeep South MagazineGifty’s research reflects the central question one asks when someone they love falls into the patterns Gyasi illustrates with such raw accuracy ... The writing is impeccable; the reader never goes so far between chronological chapters that they forget what’s happening. Each event feeds into the next, springing from her childhood in rural Alabama to her summer in Ghana to her failed relationships to now—her mother stagnating in her bed and their altered relationship an almost tangible weight on Gifty’s chest. The distance that’s so prevalent between herself and everyone she’s ever known and loved is defined by each new piece, each new event ... a thousand-piece puzzle, a masterpiece, a work of grit. It is painful and beautiful but, ultimately, it is human. This book is about Gifty’s journey to discover the answers to the questions her brother and mother left her with and the fact that, without realizing it, she was seeking transcendence. Her work seeks to dismantle the crippling aspects of humanity and though it is an admirable goal, it never gave her the true answers she was searching for. There are some things that religion or science can’t provide the answers to, and Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom illustrates the processes and pain that accompanies searching for those answers inside yourself.