Cover Image: The Nickel Boys

The Nickel Boys

Pub Date:   |   Archive Date:

Member Reviews

This is an important book but one which feels deeply and horribly familiar. Injustice, racism, corruption, sadistic cruelty, abuse of the disenfranchised by the powerful all exist in myriad contexts and there's perhaps no way of making them feel fresh or unique any more. Whitehead states in his afterword that he's telling the stories here of the real-life boys who couldn't tell them for themselves or weren't believed when they did - and that's justification enough.

As a novel, though, I found this flawed: the protagonist Elwood Curtis is little more than a cardboard cut-out, earnest, humourless, idealist and predetermined to suffer for the colour of his skin in Civil Rights-era USA. More interesting is his cynical friend Turner who is clued up on the system but has enough heart to make him the moral centre for me. And I *hated* the 'twist' at the end!

Was this review helpful?

“He couldn’t explain it, even to himself, until At Zion Hill gave him a language. We must believe in our souls that we are somebody, that we are significant, that we are worthful, and we must walk the streets of life every day with this sense of dignity and this sense of somebody-ness.”

Colson Whitehead’s 2017 Man Booker longlisted The Underground Railway was notable for its formal inventiveness but rather let down by too much exposition. My review concluded: “A novel clever in its inception and powerful in its themes but disappointingly flat in its prose and with a rather limp conclusion.”

His latest (and next) novel The Nickel Boys is rather different in style.

It shares, indeed builds on the powerful theme with a lightly fictionalised rendering of the the real-life, but still not well known, story of the Arthur G Dozier School for Boys. That these awful events happened within the last 60 years, and indeed the lifetime of the current President, rather demonstrates how the excesses of his regime (including the modern day equivalent, are perhaps less of an exception than it seems in US history, a point also made by the author in this Guardian interview: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jul/20/colson-whitehead-reality-is-kids-shot-by-racist-cops

The prose here is also more powerful, although it only really soars when Whitehead openly builds on that of Martin Luther King, whose speeches are frequently cited (see eg the opening quote).

The novel is perhaps at its best - and has its most pertinent and challenging message for readers - when contrasting (but understanding both) the attitude to racial injustice of the two main characters: Elwood, from a relatively (at least relative to the other inmates in the “colored” part of the reform school) privileged background, idealistic, but prepared to make personal sacrifices, even put his life at risk, to achieve his ideals; and his friend Turner, who has very little and simply wants to survive:

“The law was one thing—you can march and wave signs around and change a law if you convinced enough white people. In Tampa, Turner saw the college kids with their nice shirts and ties sit in at the Woolworths. He had to work, but they were out protesting. And it happened—they opened the counter. Turner didn’t have the money to eat there either way. You can change the law but you can’t change people and how they treat each other.”

But whereas The Underground Railroad was formally inventive, The Nickel Boys is a rather more conventional historical novel. The story even has a rather unnecessary “twist” (albeit one, that in contrast to most Hollywood movies, at least makes parts of the novel make more sense).

Overall an important political message but perhaps more a book for historical fiction fans and less impressive than its predecessor in pure literary fiction terms.

3 stars

Was this review helpful?

"There are people who trick you and deliver emptiness with a smile, while others rob you of your self-respect. You need to remember who you are".

The Nickel Boys is beautifully written - using prose and the extracts from MLK speeches to disclose uncomfortable truths. In this age when racial prejudice and racism seems to have found a strident voice, novels such as these are crucial in showing us the destruction caused when the people who are supposed to defend and protect the innocent turn a blind eye. What made it even more heartbreaking is the knowledge that this tale is grounded in reality, being set in Florida's Dozier School for Boys.

.. A devastating must-read.

Was this review helpful?

I'm really sad that I didn't like this as much as I thought I was going to. It's an important and timely novel, but I just could not push through it to get to the end. Whitehead writes with such tact and delicacy that it makes the horrific things feel even more so, and I was just not in the frame of mind to follow a story like this. I may return to it in the future, but for now, I'm going to put it aside.

Was this review helpful?

The Nickel Boys is an historical novel based on Dozier reform school for boys. It was chosen, handed out as a punishment alternative to prison, yet often it proved to be worse for its captives and inmates left broken, shadows of their former selves. Here the perpetrators of the most violent crimes were the jailers themselves. No one was safe, spirits were broken, ideals were quashed. It was survival of the fittest. The only law was the law inside those walls. This reform school was like so many others where rights of prisoners were lost upon entry. It was cruel and spirit breaking. Whitehead’s riveting writing style indeed is award winning and his descriptive powers here show us exactly why. So much hardship is inferred, there was no need for in-depth descriptions of the beating and abuse. We knew it was happening, that those young, tortured, impressionable inmates could do nothing to avoid it. This is another great work from Colson Whitehead, one I’d like to believe is 100% fiction but unfortunately reflects the real life trauma of those young people incarcerated here in and in some many similar institutions world wide.

Was this review helpful?

<i>Thank you NetGalley and Little, Brown Book Group for the ARC</i>

Some stories gain an extra layer of horror, because you know they're based on reality. This is one of them.

Set in 1960's Florida, it tells the story of the boys in Nickel Academy, reform school/prison. The injustice, abuse, racism and violence they experience are not just a local evil, but endorsed by society at large.

The stories of the boys before they entered the facility (I just cannot call it a 'school')and the discoveries long after they left, give further depth to the severity and gross injustice of their situation.

Even though the situation and subject matter are so heavy, the novel was easy to read and never felt preachy.

Was this review helpful?

A depressing story of the worst excesses of racism in the USA. Although this is fiction, it is based in fact. The history of a real reform school - Dozier School for Boys - in Florida that operated for more than 100 years and destroying the lives of thousands of children. 5 years ago, archaeology students from the University of Southern Florida documented details of graves found both inside and outside the grounds of Dozier School.
Whitehead’s novel opens with a similar announcement about a state investigation into crimes once
committed at the Nickel Academy reform school. Archaeologists surveying the
area have discovered an unmarked grave that had been “neatly erased from history.”
The main character, Elwood Curtis, has been abandoned by his parents and brought up by his grandmother Harriet who is strict but loving. The gift of a recording of sermons by Martin Luther King makes a big impression on him and he does his best to support the Civil Rights struggle of the early 1960's.
Elwood always tries to steer clear of trouble, staying away from the bad boys and working hard at his job in a general store. But when he hitches a lift on his way to enrol in college it turns out the car is stolen and his punishment is to be sent to the Nickel Academy. While there he tries to follow the words of the Reverend King ‘Throw us in jail, and we will still love you.’, but he soon discovers that the Nickel Academy is a place where corruption is rife and physical and sexual abuse is commonplace. Boys are whipped for the slightest reason and soon after he arrives, Elwood is beaten so badly that he ends up in hospital. Even the whippings are segregated
He makes a friend, Turner and the pair are put to work on various "outside" jobs but basically they are just slave labourers. Elwood documents the various goings on at the Academy and he plans to contact one of the school inspectors with a letter detailing the horrors inflicted on its inmates. Although Nickel is a place that "magnifies the cruelties of the world", he tries to make the best of his time there. There's an innocence about Elwood which is matched by the relentless cruelty of the reform school officials. In the safety of his grandmother's home, he was inspired by King's words but at Nickel Academy they ring hollow.
Against Elwood's naivety, there is Turner's cynicism. He believes that "You can change the law, but you can't change people and how they treat each other". Towards the end of the book there is a stunning plot twist which took me completely by surprise.
This is a deeply troubling story which made me wonder if there really has been any change in America since the days of MLK and the Freedom Riders. One quote may give the answer - "They treat us like subhumans in our country. Always have. Maybe always will."
This is a tough read, beautifully written. Recommended.
My thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK and NetGalley for a copy of this book in return for an unbiased review.

Was this review helpful?

Having loved the Underground Railroad, I was delighted to have been gifted an e-arc of The Nickel Boys.

It tells the story of a reform school for boys in Florida set up in the Jim Crow era, particularly telling the story of some of the boys based on their true stories. I fully expected to be heartbroken reading the book, as I was reading parts of The Underground Railroad and I was prepared for that. However, I have to be honest and say that I struggled with this book. The first one third of Elwood's story kept me engaged but after that, my mind kept wandering while I was reading it. I didn't feel any connection to the characters nor the emotional punch of their experiences and injustices meted out at the school and it may be that this book might have had more of an impact on me had it been delivered as a true account of the men's experiences, in their own words, rather than in a semi fictionalised layout.

It is a subject I am very interested in learning more about and I will definitely read more about this topic and would like to thank the publisher and the author for the opportunity to read The Nickel Boys in exchange for my honest opinion.

Was this review helpful?

The Nickel Boys tells the story of the fictional Nickel reform school in Florida. In the book, young men were sent to this school, often for minor offences, and were subjected to a brutal regime which some of them did not survive. We follow the story of one you man in particular, Elwood Curtis, but also, increasingly as the book progresses, the young man he befriends at Nickel, Turner. Elwood is at Nickel after a serious case of injustice motivated by racial hatred, the wrong colour skin in the wrong place at the wrong time. Injustice is a key theme through the book and it may well make your blood boil with anger at times - it did mine.

The story makes you even more angry when you learn in the acknowledgements that it is not pure fiction but is based on a real reform school, the “Arthur G Dozier School for Boys”, and a lot of the incidents described are based on the very real testimony of victims. And this is not some school from “back in the day”, but from within my lifetime with the events taking place in the late 1960s.

I have only read one other Colson Whitehead novel, that being The Underground Railroad and there is a marked difference between these two books even though both deal with race. The Underground Railroad was almost a fantasy, making the railroad not just a route slaves used to escape but an actual physical underground railroad that connected different locations. Whitehead used these different locations to examine different aspects of historic slavery and race relations in America. In The Nickel Boys, there is nothing like this, there is, in essence, simply a story that the author believes needs to be told. It is hard to disagree with him.

One thing that is very noticeable as the story develops is the quotations from speeches by Martin Luther King. For most of us, those words are wonderful speeches made by a man now famous world wide. But here, Dr King’s words are not simply great speeches, they are a challenge to be lived out. Elwood often struggles to see how he can live in the way that King urges when there is so much cruelty and injustice around him. This is especially true when he learns early on that taking any kind of stand for what is right and just can lead to effective imprisonment and violence. How can forgiveness and love operate in such a hellish place? For me, this battle to put great words and ideas into practice in real life was the most fascinating thing about the book.

The Nickel Boys doesn’t just tell the story of the school, but it also leaps forward to the present day and examines the ongoing impact of the school on men’s lives and, crucially, the work the victims do to expose the cruelty and violence that lay hidden for so long. And it is this aspect of the book that brings the story right up to date and right into the faces of its audience. It is a timely reminder that there are people today who have lived their lives as victims of horrendous racially motivated cruelty. It is therefore also a reminder that racism has not gone away: it may, in some cases, have been brushed under the carpet, but this book seeks to put a story that has lain hidden on display as a warning or a lesson. And it is very effective.

Was this review helpful?

This book is a difficult, but honest story about the life of black people in the 60s. Discrimination was a part of life, and they didn't have any of the privileges white people had. Every time I read a book like this, I just can't believe the cruelty humans are capable of. It makes you feel ashamed really.
Excellent one. Hard to read, but real.

Thanks a lot Netgalley and the publisher for this copy in exchange for an honest review.

Was this review helpful?

Ellwood is a teenage working-class African-American boy being brought up by his grandmother in Florida in the early 1960s, when, despite civil rights activism, racial segregation is still strictly enforced. Nevertheless, Ellwood has decided to do everything 'right'; he studies hard at school, is known as a reliable worker in his hotel job, and has been recommended for a special scheme allowing disadvantaged young people to take college-level classes at local black college, Melvin Griggs. He listens over and over again to a recording of Martin Luther King's speeches that his grandmother bought him, idealising non-violent protest and taking part in a civil rights march himself. Nevertheless, none of this protects Ellwood when he is wrongly accused of joyriding and sentenced to Nickel, a reformatory school for boys that is supposed to create upstanding citizens rather than subject its inhabitants to punitive imprisonment. As Ellwood reflects ironically when he first arrives at the place: 'The campus was kept up meticulously, a bounty of lush green... The cedar trees and beeches cut out portions of shade, tall and ancient. It was the nicest-looking property Ellwood had ever seen... In a sad joke, it intersected with his visions of Melvin Griggs Technical, minus a few statues and columns.'

Nickel might look good from the outside, but it's rotten on the inside: dormitories go unpainted, bleachers splinter, canteen food is stolen by the guards and sold to local businesses, boys are informally loaned out to labour for those who can do the staff a favour, and above all, there's the 'White House', where an industrial fan hides the sounds of night-time beatings. Even worse than that, however, is being 'taken out back', for after that boys tend to disappear. Whitehead conveys the horror of their fates through descriptions of archaeological excavations of their bodies in the present day, which clearly and chillingly spells out what happened to them, but avoids sensationalising their pain: 'When the state of Florida dug [one boy] up fifty years later, the forensic examiner noted the fractures in the wrists and speculated that he'd been restrained before he died, in addition to the other violence attested by the broken bones.'

The first two-thirds or so of The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead's seventh novel, follow a pretty straightforward narrative that is familiar from prison or reform school memoirs and fictions; Whitehead's take is lifted by his incredibly moving writing. A couple of incidents are horrifyingly memorable, not necessarily because of their violence but also for their poignancy, such as a notable boxing match between the champions of the 'black' and 'white' sides of the school, and the boys' pride when they decorate the place for the annual Christmas Fair. Nevertheless, I found myself wondering if there was more to this story; the two of Whitehead's previous novels that I've read, Zone One and The Underground Railroad, were both dense and intelligent, making the reader work hard in a good way, whereas this seemed to be relying on simpler emotional beats. But The Nickel Boys, too, becomes more complex later on, as Whitehead starts flashing between life after the institution and life still within it. The ending of the novel, in particular, had me in tears, as Whitehead draws together the past and present with no hope of closure in the future.

Like a number of recent novels by African-American writers (Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing, Jesmyn Ward's Sing, Unburied, Sing, Yvonne Battle-Felton's Remembered), Whitehead effectively shows how slavery is at the core of America's modern history, and shapes black lives and deaths to this day. The only thing that stopped this being a five-star novel for me was his handling of his characters. SPOILERS FOLLOW. We are led to believe that Ellwood is narrating his time in Nickel as well as his later life in New York, but at the end of the novel, it's revealed that it's his friend Turner who survived the place; Ellwood was shot dead trying to escape after a naive attempt to whistleblow on the goings-on in Nickel. The 'Ellwood' we meet in later life is in fact Turner, who has taken on his friend's name to honour him. I'm not sure why this twist was necessary. Indeed, it seemed to pit Ellwood and Turner too clearly against each other as archetypes, the 'good' black martyr who is too idealistic for this world, and the canny black survivor who understands the reality of institutional racism. As with the early chapters of the novel, Whitehead seems to sacrifice nuance for emotion. SPOILERS END. However, this is a haunting novel, and Whitehead's evocation of what was a real-life place will be difficult to forget.

Was this review helpful?

I found it difficult to engage with this story. Elwood Curtis grows up in 60's Florida, a time of race riots yet balanced with that the wonderful influential and lyrical leadership and direction of Martin Luther king. One small mistake results in Elwood being enrolled in a reform school, a home for difficult boys and an attempt to make them physically, emotionally, and intellectually better. The young Elwood Curtis meets, befriends and is greatly influenced by Turner, a fellow detainee.."The key to in here is the same as surviving out there-you got to see how people act, and then you got to figure out how to get around them like an obstacle"....The book in part explores attitude to racism at that time, whilst graphically illustrating the brutal treatment such unfortunate boys were forced to endure and suffer, incarcerated in an institution meant to help and reform young minds but ultimately destroying them. Many thanks to the good people at netgalley for a gratis copy in exchange for an honest review and that is what I have written.

Was this review helpful?

Colston Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys is a story of two teenage boys who end up in a Southern reform school with a long history of institutionalised racism, brutality and corruption. The story moves between the early 1960s and the present day, when a secret grave site is found on the grounds of the school by local archaeologists.

Whitehead addresses the struggles the boys face, Elwood’s struggles with his strong moral sense and passionate belief in the words of Dr Martin Luther King against the daily injustices and horror of life at Nickel; Turner, more circumspect, just trying to survive and get out; some of the other boys’ acts of defiance, knowing the consequences; the reasons they were sent to the school in the first place. The effects of this ‘education’ will be felt by all the boys for the rest of their lives. Although the characters are fictional, Whitehead based Nickel on a real reform school, Dozier in Florida.

What is particularly striking and clever about The Nickel Boys is Whitehead’s documentary, sparse writing style. Violence and brutality are everywhere at the school (and also in life before being sent to Nickel) but never written about excessively, the whole narrative is very focused and the effects on the reader are all the more powerful for that.

I finished the book a couple of days ago, it is easily one of the best books I’ve read this year and personally, I preferred it to The Underground Railroad. Still, I’m finding it quite hard to write about The Nickel Boys and not rage. I keep thinking about human capacity for discrimination, hate and violence against anyone perceived as ‘other’ and how we don’t seem to be able or willing to evolve. Trump’s most recent racist tirades not helping.

At one point Whitehead writes “Their daddies taught them how to keep a slave in line, passed down this brutal heirloom.” before briefly documenting the history of solitary confinement cells in juvenile institutions, outlawed after WW2. “But the rooms waited, blank and still and airless. They waited for boys in need of attitude adjustment. They wait still, as long as the sons – and the sons of those sons – remember.”

Highly recommended read. My thanks to Little, Brown and Netgalley for the opportunity to read The Nickel Boys.

Was this review helpful?

Colson Whitehead’s “The Underground Railroad” won both the Pulitzer Prize and National Book award and was longlisted for the Booker prize – but as well as its literary prize recognition it gained a number of nominations for Science Fiction prizes and won the prestigious Arthur C Clarke award.

That book, in simple terms, told a familiar story in an unfamilar way.

The sadly familiar story is of brutality on Southern American slave plantations. The unfamilar way is by turning the “Underground railroad” used to describe the route slaves took to escape, into a physical railway connecting cities and states with different variations on race relations. He used this device to trace not just the history of black slavery in America, but to relate it to race relations across American history up to the present day, and to draw on other analogies including the Holocaust and even Slavery in Republican Rome.

The author’s latest novel is perhaps best described as also examining the legacy of slavery and the practice of racism in America, but by doing the opposite - telling an unfamiliar story in a familiar way.

The story is of a Florida based reform school Nickel, whose pupils or inmates, often sent there for minor offences, are subject to forced labour for the state (and via corruption for the staff of the school), savage beatings, rape, punishment cells and in some cases unexplained disappearances (believed to be after fatal beatings followed by burials in unmarked graves). Although white and coloured boys are sent to the school, they are strictly segregated and the coloured boys subject to particularly harsh treatment.

Whereas Whitehead’s previous book relied on fantasy – what is particularly shocking about this book is that it is a very light fictionalisation of a real school – the Arthur G Dozier (or Florida) School for Boys – and perhaps even more shockingly the events portrayed are not from the 19th Century but the late 1960s. On one level I was shocked to not be aware of the events portrayed – but Whitehead himself only became aware in 2014 and I think that the choice to make this at core relatively conventional (by his standards) novel is simply because the story is deeply impactful without need for embellishment or a new perspective.

Where the author does round out the story is in two ways.

Firstly by bringing in the words and teachings of Martin Luther King and examining the challenge of living them in practice. The main protagonist in the story Elwood, starts the book listening repeatedly to a LP of King’s sermons and speeches and follows the Civil Rights movement passionately – plotting how he can get directly involved using his educational prowess. But when simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time (hitching a lift in a car which was stolen) leads to him being sent to Nickel and both witnessing and personally experiencing the racist brutality there, he struggles to come to terms with how to forgive those oppressing him and by doing to resist their racist agendas. Even then he retains a belief in justice and is convinced that even if the boys cannot help themselves, others will come to their rescue when their plight is known (he imagines the National Guard taking over the prison). His views are contrasted with the more cynical and world weary Turner – the secondary character in the novel – who gradually befriends Elwood.

The second is in a modern day framing device for the novel – examining, with a twist, the lasting impact of Nickel on the lives of those staying there and the gradual exposure of the practices in the 21st Century.

Recommended. My thanks to Vantage for an ARC via NetGalley. I will post the review to Goodreads 2 weeks ahead of publication.

Was this review helpful?

The Nickel school of the title was based on a real school in Florida which somehow makes this compelling story even more devastating. Straight away the reader is thrown in to the horrors of the school as the true story of what went on there is uncovered by experts examining the remains found in both the official and the deeply disturbing unofficial graveyards, found as the school was being cleared to make way for a new building. We then switch between past and present as Elwood looks back on his childhood and the events that led him to Nickel rather than the college he was so excited to attend. Like the others lucky enough to survive, Nickel has scarred Elwood and he struggles to cope with normal life. That’s because, although his childhood was difficult, nothing could have prepared this intelligent young man who was convinced that Martin Luther King was going to be able to right the wrongs in American society, for the beatings, the trips to ‘lover’s lane’ with certain staff and the random killing of the young people who’d been sent there to ‘get them on the straight and narrow’ in a healthy educational environment.
This is not the sort of novel you could describe as enjoyable but it is so moving and well-told that I read the first half in one sitting, stopping only because I had to be elsewhere. I defy anyone to be dry-eyed at the end of it!

Was this review helpful?

A very important contribution to the ongoing discussion about race and identity that I am recommending to all my customers as an absolute MUST READ!

Was this review helpful?

Brutally honest book concerning life of black people during the 60s, when segregation was still very much the norm. It shows that one little mistake could cost someone everything they've worked for, and not only that, also be punished in the most vicious and despicable ways imaginable.
Very difficult read about torture in the name of "betterment" and "training".

Was this review helpful?

The Nickel Boys is what happens when The Shawshank Redemption meets When They See Us meets Colson Whitehead’s faultless instincts as a novelist. Some books are 5 stars because they strike a chord with your own specific reading tastes; some are 5 stars because they are so good everybody should read them. This book is firmly in the latter category.

The Nickel Boys is about a reformatory school for boys (basically a prison) in the Jim Crow years, based on a real-life institution and the horrendous abuses that took place there. Whitehead treats this material with care – it is a finely calibrated balancing act that conveys the truth of what occurred in such places, without resorting to shock value or stepping over the line into gratuitous detail. This is a novel that achieves its emotional resonance not through brutality, but by making the reader fall in love with its characters.

We follow Elwood Curtis, a sweet kid, diligent, bright, aspiring to a college education. His misfortune to be in the wrong place at the wrong time (‘wrong’ for an African-American boy in 1960s Florida, wrongness being relative) lands him at The Nickel Academy. There Elwood befriends the streetwise and cynical Turner, whose personality contrasts starkly with his own. Nevertheless, they form a life-long bond, their destinies forever intertwined.

At Nickel, Elwood struggles to reconcile a self-preservation instinct with his idealistic streak: he knows the best way to survive is to keep his head down but at the same time his conscience compels him to emulate his heroes in the Civil Rights movement, to make a stand. With nuance and delicacy, the novel explores this impossible paradox of trying to resist an oppressive power structure while living within it – any form of activism is at the risk of one’s own life.

Whitehead’s prose style here is deceptively plain. Economical and direct, this is the kind of writing that belies its own sophistication and makes this a very accessible read. The cadence and tone evoke an earnestness and sense of innocence (or perhaps, naïveté) that captures the spirit of the story perfectly. It’s also quite a short book that, for its size, makes a mighty impression. The Nickel Boys is a novel with an enormous heart that’s sure to break yours. 5 stars.

Was this review helpful?

This novel is small in size but mighty in content. Based upon the harrowing experiences of a real-life 'reform' school the story is heart-wrenching yet beautifully told.

Was this review helpful?

In order to understand the complexities of our present times it is I would argue necessary to obtain an appreciation and knowledge of the past. This can be done through the reading of history books and first hand contemporaneous accounts of those who were there at the time. To supplement this there is the reading of first class fiction based on real life events which gives an extra resonance and depth. Colson Whitehead is famous for his best selling book "The Underground Railroad" a thrilling tale of escape from slavery in the American deep south. Here he has produced another deeply disturbing but thoroughly engrossing novel this time dealing with the continuing endemic and Institutionalised racism that originated from the time of slavery.

Based on the history and real life events at the Dozier School for Boys in Marianna Florida we follow the early 1960's story of Elwood Curtis who despite leading an exemplary life of study and hard work is due to no fault of his own sent to the The Nickel Academy. Here he enters a nightmarish world of abuse of all kinds under the supposed protection of the State of Florida. He makes a friend of a boy called Turner who's views are diametrically opposed to Elwood's idealism and belief system inspired by the words of Dr Martin Luther King. In an environment where death either through accident or disappearance is a regular occurrence which of either Elwood or Turner is best equipped to survive

I do not want to give too much away but there is a terrific jaw dropping twist at the end which I never saw coming and gives extra resonance to the plot. I'm not American and have not even visited there but I get the impression that if American society does not address and atone for its deeply ingrained and systemic racist past then it will be unable to move forward as one united country with no splits and divisions. A really moving and thought provoking read.

Was this review helpful?