It is difficult, if not impossible, for newly released convicts to get back on their feet after their sentences. The lucky ones find jobs and have support networks. Unlucky ones, like Jodi in Mesha Maren’s Sugar Run, have no guidance after they are set at liberty. All Jodi has is an appointment with a parole officer, a $400 loan from her family, and a self-imposed mission to find a friend from eighteen years prior with whom she has unfinished business. Jodi was a very young girl when she went in, with no advanced education or job skills; she was in prison for longer than she was free. All that said, I think any reader can agree that the choices Jodi makes after she finishes her sentence are definitely not the right choices.

We meet Jodi on the bus from Jaxton Prison, where she has just finished serving eighteen years for manslaughter. She has a vague plan to go back to the town her lover, Paula, was from in Georgia to pick up the lover’s younger brother, to save him from an abusive family. Long flashbacks slowly reveal what happened between Jodi and Paula that landed Jodi in prison for so long. In between the flashbacks, we watch Jodi as she makes one bad decision after another: she picks up a drug addict with three kids who is in the middle of a long, emotional drama with her musician husband; she helps said drug addict kidnap those kids; she squats on family land that was auctioned off for taxes; she lets her brother store drugs and more on the property. There’s a lot of alcohol and a lot of drugs in this novel, which absolutely does not help things.

Sugar Run depicts a train wreck of a life. There are so many points in Jodi’s story where, if she’d had a bit more perspective and a bit more of a vision of what she wanted her life to be, Jodi might have been okay. Jodi might also have been okay if she’d had a functional support system, if she hadn’t returned to the economically depressed mountains of West Virginia, if she hadn’t fallen in lust with a drug addict. But then, Jodi might also have been okay right from the very beginning if it weren’t for her jealously and complete inability to say no to people who want her to do illegal things for them. Which brings me back around to the question about whether or not it’s possible for convicts to have any kind of life after serving time. Is it Jodi’s circumstances or her personality that landed her in trouble? Is it her situation or her inability to learn from her mistakes that keeps her from a legal kind of life? Sugar Run doesn’t give us any answers along with these questions, but it offers plenty of food for thought about readers curious about prison and judicial reform or life in Appalachia. This is an excellent book club read.

This book had my attention for the first bit, and the description had me hooked, but after a while I was just bored. I wanted it to move so much faster than it did.

attempt to give each book I read a fighting chance. I read until around 100 pages even if I struggle with it. With advanced reader copies, of which this was one, I really try to read the entire book. As a potential writer myself, I feel this is only respectful to do. Sugar Run by Miesha Maren was given those same chances.

That said, I struggled so much with this book to finish and find some way to keep reading. I simply couldn’t . I found myself re-reading passages, flipping back to see what I might have missed, and yet, couldn’t keep track of who is who and what is going on in the story.

I found too much going on with the story to figure out the characters and what drove their actions. Jodi and Miranda did not draw me in. I couldn’t connect with the characters, nor the community in which they lived.

Thanks to #NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

I regret that it was not for me.

Excited about Mesha Maren's forthcoming book, I read a NetGalley ARC and said I'd give an honest review, get this book!

Jodi has spent more than half her life in prison, this book begins the day she is released. Part of her is stuck in what happened, she's drawn to old haunts of motels, women, roadside bars, and card tables until she can get home to a cabin in a West Virginia. What's hard about prison is that while the mountains and the people changed, Jodi hasn't. Characters cast long shadows that stretch towards cultural touchstones like Aileen Wournos or George Jones and Tammy Wynette. For anyone who's ever sought refuge from judgment, this is a tender, relatable Southern road novel longing for and loyal to the idea of a home place and loving relationships, about mountain people and a working class family being seen.

SUGAR RUN is a well-written, assured debut novel. I am a fan of books like this - gritty and yet beautiful, intense and yet quiet. There's a lot of depth here, which I really appreciate. And the characters, particularly Jodi, really drew me in. The setting is portrayed vividly as are the characters' journeys. At times this feels like a psychological novel, meaning that we really get to explore the inner psyche and what makes people tick - or what makes them change. While at times a character's motivation or what got them to their current predicament seems a bit obscure, I nonetheless felt like I was in capable hands throughout.

Just couldn’t relate to this book or any of the characters. Very difficult to follow. I do not recommend this. Very dark read.

I enjoyed thus novel by Mesha Maren. It is the story of a woman that is being released from prison . It follows her life journey in the oresent and in the past (pre-prison). Jodi ‘s life has not been easy.. She has been sent to live with her grandmother. She is given no clear reason why this has happened. Jodi seems to be a person who makes the best of things so life goes on
From there the novel show Jodi having a sexual partner named Miranda . The pre/
prison life shows Jodi with her sexual partner named Paula. Themes of poverty, drugs ,
unlawful activity’ and abandonment are woven very nicely into this novel by the author.
Due to the nature of the topics there is swearing and explicit details of sexual activity. in some scenes . This is necessary because the life of the main character , Jodi’s, life needs to shown as exactly how horrific it is. Reading this novel will make you more aware of others ‘ plights . I would recommend this novel to others.


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I had to DNF this one. It felt like a slow, heavy read. When was something going to happen? What was the actual plot? I was forcing myself to goo but the writing was too heavy for me.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this title.

Tried to give this book an honest read, but couldn't even get through half of it. I should have read the description better to know this book was not for me. Too many characters and not enough of a storyline to stick with it. Thank you NetGalley for the ARC, but this book is just not for me.

Jodi has just been released from 18 years in prison and is looking for Ricky before she moves back with her family.

10% of the way into the book and already there were too many "ain't gonna's' for my taste and I had to stop reading.

Thank you NetGalley for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest opinion.

I have a personal policy of reading 100 pages before giving up on a book. This is a book I quit.

I found too much going on with the story to figure out the characters and what drove their actions. Jodi and Miranda did not draw me in.

This was a NetGalley book. I regret that it was not for me.

I received an ARC of this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Well-written novel with gritty characters.