These Heavy Black Bones

by Rebecca Achieng Ajulu-Bushell

*Listed as one of TIME's 18 Black leaders working to end the racial wealth gap*

In Kenya the pool was green and surrounded by concrete so hot it burnt the soles of her small feet. She didn’t know any different. A decade later she would be double British Champion and the first Black women ever to swim for Great Britain. But this story is not about making history.

As her body and mind are sharpened through gruelling training, press scrutiny, and the harshness of adolescence, Rebecca questions who she is swimming for, and what the onward journey to the Olympics will cost her.

A compulsive and unforgettable study of intensity, These Heavy Black Bones meditates on Blackness, identity, and the ecstasy of peak physical performance. In stunning prose, Rebecca charts her careers’s ascent, her singular love of the water, and lays bare the pressures within her swimming world.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Sports

Kindle Edition

Published June 6, 2024

Reviews

[Kallie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't like this as much as I had hoped. The author keeps us at a distance despite sharing intimate details of her training life. Everything is written with emotional detachment, and we don't get a growing sense she wants to leave swimming competition until towards the end when she just announces it. The actual subject matter of a Black minority student in a rigorous training program is interesting and frustrating to read, but not my favorite memoir overall.

[Juliet Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love swimming memoirs and this is outstanding: poetic, truthful, evocative.

It particularly pleases me to read a memoir from the British swimming scene, and even more so from a non-Olympian.
Having read dozens of memoirs of Aussie and American olympic gold swimmers, they all fade to nothing compared to this book. So many just present a homogenous, cookie cutter Olympic swimmer experience- bland part-truths written with an eye on their personal brand, their sponsorship deals and their sports governing bodies.

This memoir absolutely evokes the experience of being a young swimmer- the brutality of the training regime, the aloneness, the dehumanisation.

The writing actually recreates the emotions- the arrogance of a competitor in their prime; the steely will to endure; the compulsion to push beyond the point of pain; the sick trickle of doubt, the festering anxiety that grow to incapacitate you; the joylessness and the pressure of feeling 'owned'; the despair of giving up.


The absence of care for these children (not only those in swimming boarding schools) pushed by coaches who dehumanise children to fulfil their own ambitions is laid bare. When did it become completely acceptable and unremarkable to push a child to the point of vomiting in training? and then make them get back in and carry on? And the children see it as a badge of honour: dogs who are broken and trained to lock themselves into their own crates- a genius analogy.


I particularly loved the writing in these passages:

the prologue

describing a relay takeover- and the aftermath of the ensuing DQ at World Schools

the bad swim at Budapest

the 50m semi final at Delhi

It's a remarkable read.

[Ellen Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Insightful, emotionally raw, and poetically written. I really loved this book.

[Voyage · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't get what the point of the book was. For the author to complain about her childhood? To show that being an athlete is hard? That she was unhappy and depressed?

I didn't enjoy the book — I didn't learn much about swimming, I wasn't entertained by the story, I had no empathy for the author (which surprised me, as I'm usually very touched by any character, fictional or real, after just a few pages), but all along the book, she seemed aloof, ungrateful, distanced from everyone else, even the reader.

I pushed myself to keep reading as I expected the book to improve, for the narrator to mature, for there to be a turning point... but there was nothing.

The book wasn't even particularly well written, jumping from one scene to the next without exploring what was happening, it was just confusing as a lot of context was missing.

I read much better memoirs about swimming.

[Beachcomber · Rating 2 out of 5]

This sounded really interesting, but while it is a first hand account of elite sports training by a teenager, and explores what it was also like as a mixed race athlete, I found it quite hard work to read. Partly the sheer sacrifice and dedication required, and the treatment by people like Roan. But also partly that it was quite jarring to read about someone who sometimes is quite arrogant, other times not. She also comes across as quite aloof, and it was then hard to make a connection. Also, sometimes the writing got a little floral in terms of describing things, not something I enjoy. I wish I’d enjoyed this more, and clearly others have rated it much higher, so I might just been the outlier…

[Pauline Musembi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book tells the incredible story of swim training in the lead up to the olympics for a mixed race Rebecca. She goes through a lot and misses out on a lot for swimming.

However, the book took a while to read as it was written/ edited so inconsistently with floral language at times and very direct at other points. It also felt like while the author shared her story of what happened to her, she kept the reader at arm’s length and didn’t delve into her own emotional processing or the on impact of a heavy training schedule on her as she navigates early adulthood.

Would have liked more vulnerability but I understand that this emotional processing is likely still happening and maybe a second book in 10 years will provide much more reflection and connection.

[Rai · Rating 2 out of 5]

(2.5-3*) Mixed feelings about this memoir. I loved the way the author described the feeling of swimming and what it was like to be in the water. But the way the whole book was written was all over the place - it started off quite fluid and almost poetry-like, but then it switched to regular memoir and then just became confusing. The chronology was messy, it felt hard to track what age she was, where she was in her swimming career, what tournament she was at. It was at times uncomfortable to read what the author went through but that is exactly why it should be read; the vulnerability from her was so compelling. I just wish it was more consistent with the writing.

[Anthony · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rebecca Achieng Ajulu-Bushell (2024) THESE HEAVY BLACK BONES  (AUDIOBOOK)
BorrowBox - Cannongate Books

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5 out of 5 stars

BorrowBox writes, "In Kenya the pool was green and surrounded by concrete so hot it burnt the soles of her small feet. She didn’t know any different. A decade later she would be double British Champion and the first Black women ever to swim for Great Britain. But this story is not about making history.
As her body and mind are sharpened through gruelling training, press scrutiny, and the harshness of adolescence, Rebecca questions who she is swimming for, and what the onward journey to the Olympics will cost her.
A compulsive and unforgettable study of intensity, These Heavy Black Bones meditates on Blackness, identity, and the ecstasy of peak physical performance. In stunning prose, Rebecca charts her careers’s ascent, her singular love of the water, and lays bare the pressures within her swimming world."
=====
Really really recommend.
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#RebeccaAchiengAjuluBushell #TheseHeavyBlackBones #Book #Books #Read #Reads #Reading #Review #Reviews #BookReview #BookReviews #GoodReads #Audiobook #Audiobooks #BorrowBox

[Lia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a deeply emotional book and I enjoyed reading it a lot. I picked it up for a project for my master's degree and I couldn't have chosen better. I felt all kinds of emotions with Achieng's writing and I truly hope she knows she will always be a winner in my eyes.

The struggle to find herself in a place where she feels she doesn't belong, battling with fear, disappointment, high expectations and growing up at the same time is very difficult and her coming to terms with her identity was very touching.

[Jennifer Connolly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This wouldn’t have been something I would have gravitated towards myself but my first read for book club! Don’t usually read nonfiction but this was a really well written account the struggles of being a mix race athlete in a white dominated sport and a lack of belonging on top of the pressures that are placed on child prodigies. The prose were beautifully written with this memoir often reading like a novel.

[Albertina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so moving and honest. Rebecca takes you through the formative years of her life and the heights and experiences most of us will never fully understand. The book is so well written - I felt every bit of determination, anxiety, loneliness and darkness with her. I hope every swimmer, athlete, black woman - anyone - that needs to read this book is able to ❤️

[Kayla Paige · Rating 3 out of 5]

*Audiobook*

Interesting to learn about this young athelte's journey and burn out. I hated the audio-- she read it so flatly I felt depressed but then again, perhaps that was the point?

It feels like Rowan made her write a book --she doesn't really want us to know her and keeps readers distant as well as herself distant from the experiences.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

A champion swimmer AND a gorgeous writer!! 👏👏👏

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully written. The pressure put on such a young girl as GB's first black swimmer makes difficult reading. As a swimming parent an essential read.

[Anastasia · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a brave book. Takes a lot of courage to do what she did, especially at such a young age. A great read for anyone at a crossroads.

[Cian Aherne · Rating 5 out of 5]

An honest raw truth of a very different kind of sports story. I enjoyed the way it was written and felt the author had some hard-hitting real insights about the world she inhabited.

[Nicholas McMullen · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you want vivid insights into the frankly dreadful world of training for competitive swimming. This is a book to read. Powerfully and often poetically describes what it is like to swim fast and the swimmers unique relationship with water.Alongside the coaching relationship which slips too often into coercive bullying However at times I found it a little overwritten and in turn almost dull. Massive respect for the author and her lived experience though.

[Uzoamaka · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read like it was written in a prose style but I got the general gist of a mixed race girls journey in the world of competitive swimming. Tough choices had to be made throughout that would define her but I wanted more. Seeing as this is my first dive (pardon the pun) into the world of swimming I wanted to know more and thought it ended too soon so I hope for a part2.