Seven Days in June

The review

When I was younger, and reading many romance books with characters that looked exactly the same, all I could think was how much I wanted a genuine love story with black characters. I wanted to read a book where you could feel their chemistry; feel their tension & struggles; and most of all, feel their love for one another. Tia Williams’ Seven Days in June does exactly that. Eva and Shane are magnificent characters that reflect a deep and true love despite the years they spent apart. Throughout this whole book, it is a push and pull of should we or should we not because they are simultaneously each other’s weakness and strength. They were perfectly bad for each other, yet perfectly perfect for each other.

There are many other noteworthy things to mention about this book, but I am going to stick to one in order to not reveal any spoilers. If you could not already tell, I am more a fan of character driven books than plot driven books, so I found the characterization in this book to be out of this world. Tia Williams’ did a terrific job writing Eva and Shane’s characters because she did not make these black character’s pain and trauma be based on their blackness; instead, she demonstrated how their pain and trauma is worsened because of their blackness. The author cleverly depicted the black experience without writing overt scenes of racism, but rather shows the inner workings of racism and how it constructs their lives in correspondence with the other personal issues they go through. One of my favorite quotes in the book came from Shane as it summed up this point: “The burden isn’t on me to explain it… the burden’s on y’all to fix it. Good luck.”

Overall, this book was heartfelt, suspenseful, joyful, and heartbreaking all at the same time, but most of all, it was good.  I highly recommend it!

Who should read this book?

If you love black love and want to see a genuine portrayal of characters dealing with everyday issues, this one’s for you.

Who shouldn’t read this book?

I believe this book is perfect for many, but if you struggle with reading about addiction, suicide, or physical and mental health issues, you can skip this one.