A Brief History of Seven Killings

Author: Marlon James

The title of this book is misleading. It is neither brief nor are there only seven killings. This is one of the most difficult books that I read this year. It was even harder than “Capital in the Twenty First Century”, Thomas Picketty’s 700 page economic treatise. Marlon James makes liberal use of Jamaican slang and I had to consult the Urban dictionary for words like Bloodcloth, Sammie, Yardie, etc. The book is a long story written in different voices many of which I found hard to follow. Here’s an example 

Me take foot. Me walking, me foot moving faster but you getting louder, louder, louder and me take a stop and look and you nearer than before 

OR 

Me not me no more, me don’t sound like me only and no people deh ‘bout, only shadow and no sound dropping through the speaker, only the deep end of the ridden.

It’s one thing to read a single sentence like this. But when you have to wade through hundreds of pages of this, it gets tiresome. This book is also not for the faint-hearted. There are many many gruesome murders that are described in gory detail. I had always thought of Jamaican’s as a peace loving people. After reading this book, I understood that the truth was far from that, back in the 70s and 80s. Mr. James does a splendid job of immersing you in the ghettos in Jamaica in the 70s. You get a good sense for the birthplace of Reggae. Even though Bob Marley is not explicitly named in the book, it is very clear that “the Singer” refers to him. I am told that while this is a work of fiction, there are many elements that are based on events surrounding Bob Marley in the 70s.


While the book seems to meander along with what looks like senseless violence, it finally turns a corner in the latter part and things come together. You understand why there are all these seemingly unrelated stories being told and how they all fit together in the grand scheme of things. Mr. James does pull it together nicely in the end.