#112 in Historical fiction
Beloved
- 338
- Pages
- about 6 h
- Reading time
- Film 1998
- On screen
- NYT bestseller · 1 week on the list, peaked at #9
- Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
- 20th Century's Greatest Hits: 100 English-Language Books of Fiction
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Our view
“Beloved” uses a ghost story to show what slavery does to the inner life long after freedom. A formerly enslaved mother lives in a house that is haunted, as her memory is. Morrison’s prose is dense and often very beautiful, reaching tenderness as well as horror. Voices and time periods shift without warning, and some readers lose their footing along the way; the subject is painful in itself. It rewards slow reading.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Beloved is a 1987 novel by American novelist Toni Morrison. Set in the period after the American Civil War, the novel tells the story of formerly enslaved people whose Cincinnati home is haunted by a malevolent spirit. Sethe, a formerly enslaved mother of four, grapples with her traumatic past. Morrison sought to depict the limitations that enslaved women faced and to present a physical manifestation that was lacking in the world of literature. Moreover, Beloved explores the interior life of the formerly enslaved.
Reading order · Beloved Trilogy
Full order & progress →- BelovedThis book
8.08.0 / 10 - Jazz
7.97.9 / 10 - ParadiseParadise–Not ranked yet
On screen
This book has been adapted for the screen once.
- FilmBelovedIMDb
Adaptation data: Wikidata · On screen →
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.8 across 680 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 82% of the weight and the score stays at 8.0 — the Historical fiction average of 8.0 barely moves it. A further +0.10 comes from the small bonus for major awards.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 7.8 | 75 | 11% |
| Hardcover | 7.9 | 605 | 89% |
Frequently asked
How long is Beloved?
It has 338 pages — shorter than 74% of the ranked books in Historical fiction.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
The same shelf — Historical fiction — and a score of 8.0, the closest to this book.
