I didn't love this unfortunately; I think it was my least favourite Whitehead novel. There was a lot going on, and a lot of characters to get hold of, but at the same time all of the action seemed to happen off the page.

I usually love books set in NYC, so the Harlem setting should have been perfect for me. However, the race riots also seemed at a distance so I just didn't feel involved in the book at all.

I nearly DNF at around 30% in but persevered and the book did get better after this point.

Favourite books of 2021:
#HarlemShuffle. @colsonwhitehead blends together a
family saga, crime novel & American Civil Rights reportage; as businessman Ray Carney navigates his way through 1960's Harlem and everything life throws at him.

REVIEW: Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead

Ray Carney owns a furniture shop on 125th street, to his customers he is an upstanding and friendly salesman. However, money is tight, and he has links to crooks through his father. When his cousin, Freddie, drops of jewellery at his door, he doesn’t ask where it’s come from and is happily to sell it on. Freddie gets tangles up in some darker crimes and that means Carney does too.

This is my first Colson Whitehead even though I’ve had both The Underground Railroad and The Nickel Boys on my shelves for a very long time. This novel didn’t entirely work for me though unfortunately. There is no denying that Whitehead is a very talented writer, I loved his writing style so am still looking forward to reading his backlist. The story has such an appealing backdrop and sense of place – the Harlem setting I felt was quite vivid.

I just felt like the plot was lacking. Whitehead goes on detailed tangents and back-stories which a lot of the time I found boring, and I would find my attention drifting off. Too much of the action, seeing as I went into this expecting a crime novel, happens ‘off-stage’ and not on the page, which is frustrating.

Overall, Harlem Shuffle contains brilliant writing but just not a compelling enough plot for me.

Whitehead seems to be at his best when he's telling stories from periods of time he's more familiar with. Like he does here, covering Harlem in the '60s but also recalling the glamour of Harlem before everything went wrong. The atmosphere recreated in the novel is very cinematic, it brought to mind early Hollywood Noir. In fact is rather interesting who this novel reads like a Noir, despite not being one in the full sense of the word: dark atmosphere, sex and violence on all fronts, black "Mafia", flawed characters, a fine line constantly being broken between right and wrong.

Personally I've enjoyed everything about Harlem Shuffle: from the writing style, to the characters, to the setting and so on. I found myself really rooting for Ray. Despite all his misgivings and his constant decent into the underbelly of Harlem, I really wanted him to succeed, to be the upstanding man he so much desired to be!

My route into Colson Whitehead was The Underground Railroad whose magical realism based on a common misunderstanding was both a killer hook to a harrowing but terrific novel. Harlem Shuffle has none of the formal tricksiness of The Underground Railroad, but it exudes the confidence of a writer who knows that by spinning a drawn out, three part crime drama he can also essay the demographic and political changes of Harlem through the fifties and sixties. So whether you are drawn by the big picture stuff or the low level crime and corruption saga you'll find out plenty from both sides.

The book is centred around Ray Carney, who runs a furniture store and is a low level fence on the side. He doesn't see himself as a criminal, as he is most interested in the shop, though as the book progresses he does get deeper and deeper into the mire. But compared to he crooked Dad, or his cousin Freddie, he is a paragon of society. Perhaps not good enough for his wife's parents and their middle class businessmen's society, but exactly what Harlem needs to get better. This is New York and Ray's trips around the city illustrate the racism and classism of the time (there is an excellent section where Ray is trying to close a deal on a furniture supplier that has never supplied a black store before). But in the first section he is drawn into a heist at a Black Hotel, the second he is out for revenge on the pillar of society who cheated him and it all comes together in the final section where Freddie is mixed up with drugs, property and the white elite in New York. The way Whitehead manages to slowly get Ray involved in so many aspects of New York society is organic and feels natural, but by the end of the book you feel you know the shape of 60's Harlem.

This has confirmed me as a fan of Whitehead, and I will need to track down some of his earlier stuff. Accessible without being condescending, he fills in the gaps of some of the non-fiction I had read about New York's history and makes a solid plea for the guy who gets by. Ray has relatively modest ambitions, but still can't quite get by without a bit of crime. Equally his reaction to being cheated is relentless (and interestingly has a much more wide ranging effect). Ray isn't going to get his revenge down the barrel of a gun, indeed Ray doesn't commit any violence here, but its not to say he doesn't know how to respond. Its those guys, the seemingly ordinary guys, who make stories that are also stories about neighbourhoods and society work. Whitehead has his balance just right, make the thriller work, and the rest is gravy.

Usually love Colson Whitehead but found this one a little long and hard to keep up with who was who. It didn’t flow well and was repetitive in places, but well written and some good characterisation.

Whitehead's 'The Underground Railroad' was one of the best and most engrossing books I have read, so a new book by this author is always exciting. 'Harlem Shuffle' is, of course, superbly written and evokes a rich experience of Harlem in the early 1960s. It is a world about which I knew nothing, and it is always satisfying to learn about other worlds, so far from my own. The 3-part structure was unusual in that it was more like three linked novellas about the same set of characters; the man character being the likeable and ethically compromised Harlem furniture store owner, Ray Carney, I would have liked to have read more about his life with his wife and children; they felt very peripheral, yet clearly to Carney, his family were at the core of his being. His wayward cousin Freddie, more his bro than his cousin, caused him endless trouble, and was the biggest challenge to Carney's desire to stay away from hard crime. This novel is not an easy read, but worth the effort. It didn't seem at all to me to be a crime thriller, but more of a high-end book club novel. But disappointingly, I didn't feel the emotional pull of 'The Underground Railroad' either to the characters or to the predicaments they got into.. '

Colson Whitehead really is a true master of literature, he has the ability to turn his hand to anything and always creates an, engrossing and outstanding story. This is a fascinating story, that transports the reader to Harlem in the 1960's. Colson’s writing is so good you feel like you’re stepping into Harlem and in the 60s there’s a white New York and a black New York (not that much has changed over time) but he creates an engrossing crime/heist-gone-wrong novel that is atmospheric and rich with details. As ever I am looking forward to Colson’s next book as like all his books they’ve always left me wanting more from the author

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy for an honest opinion

The first chapter of this book gave me the feeling that I had come in on the middle of a conversation. All I managed to glean from it was that the story is about a man named Mr. Carney and he knows people who repair televisions and radios on a street where electronics shops feature.

The story takes shape, but it's told in a sort of fast paced, clipped style that makes you feel like you're being told it by someone from New York, which is no doubt the intent. I found it a little difficult, as I'm used to a more flowing storyteller style of writing.

It is set in 1960s Harlem and tells the story of a mostly honest furniture dealer who gets caught up in the local crime scene when all he intended was the occasional side hustle. It's a good look into a time and place that few outside of that era and location ever see and how easy it is to get caught up in a world of crime when you live on the less privileged side of society.

A wonderful novel from the author of The Underground Railway!

This was perhaps less weighty than The Underground Railway, less 'worthy' without losing its worth as a novel.... but perhaps that is my issue: I have never been terribly comfortable with slavery as a subject for novels.
Crime, however, is absolutely fine and the ease with which a normal everyman can slide into and disappear into criminality was wonderfully authentic, never sentimental and gently humourous, ironic and satirical. There was something almost Dickensian in the flavour here...

This for me would be a good starting point to Colson as an author

A charming and powerful novel on the intricate web of morals and motives in 1960's Harlem with some uncomfortable parallels to our modern day.

A fascinating story of life in 1960s New York.

The book follows the life of Ray Carney - an independent furniture salesman - who finds himself more and more intertwined with a criminal world. He finds himself treading the line between great success and great failure - veering, at times, from one to the other. Ray also has to balance the morality of gains through illegitimate means versus the gains themselves and the benefits that they bring to him and his family. When Ray's cousin takes one bad step too many, Ray has to decide what he can gamble to help his family.

An insightful look at a city through time (fictional yet closely based on reality) and a cutting critique of racial inequalities, then and now.

I have only read The Nickel boys, which despite having enjoyed, it was far from a perfect novel for me. There is no doubt in my mind that Colson Whitehead is an incredibly talented writer, and I appreciate his books being (plot wise) so different from one another. However, the common thread I see in both Harlem Shuffle and The Nickel boys is a level of detachment that makes it hard for me to connect with characters and the novel.
I appreciate Harlem Shuffle in its intent to depict Harlem in the 1960s, and it does a great job in that. The 3 parts could be read as 3 separate stories. The first was the least compelling to me, with the 2 next ones being much stronger.

An interesting crime novel and great writing. If this is the genre you gravitate towards, you might really enjoy this.

DNF @ 47%.

Couldn’t get into this at all, and I really wanted to like it as I’ve heard great things about this author. Unfortunately I found myself finding other things to do rather than read this book, and when I did sit down to read I would only read a few pages before getting bored and doing something else.
As some other reviews have stated, there was a lot of describing the action after the action had happened, making it not so much of a crime thriller but a book that was lacking something. A lot of introducing characters and then them disappearing and never being heard from again and a lot of jumping between time frames.
The descriptions were great and I could picture where was being described so clearly, but this just wasn’t a book for me. A real shame because I really wanted to like this book!

I've had Whitehead's (by all accounts phenomal) novels, The Underground Railroad and The Nickel Boys, sitting on my shelf waiting to be read for a shameful amount of time and I joked when I said Harlem Shuffle would end up being my first Whitehead novel back when I first requested it. Well, here we are. I'm glad this was my Whitehead introduction though. I'm glad because it wasn't phenomenonal and I would've hated to be let down.

At first I thought it was my fatigued brain struggling to connect or keep track of the shifting cast of characters and tangling plot threads but, as I made my slow progress, I felt more sure it was actually the prose that was getting distracted by itself, it was the prose stepping out of focus. Ultimately, Harlem Shuffle failed to deliver a story I was fully engaged by or invested in.

Let me make it clear: this is a perfectly enjoyable book. In fact, at sentence level it's meticulously crafted and every other page holds a turn of phrase to give you pause. Mostly, Whitehead asks us to pause for the city, to consider the layers it peels away in.

'You could never know what was going on with other people, but their private selves were never far away. The city was one teeming, miserable tenement and the wall between you and everybody else was thin enough to punch through.'

'...he recognised his own features in the white brick apartment houses and silver deco steeples, found his face returned to him in the pitiless steel and concrete of the city.'

Whitehead's Harlem lives. It breathes. It shuffles one foot before the other. But all too often, it moves without us, it leaves us behind. So, maybe if you know the city the novel will feel like home, but I was a stranger and I was lost the entire time.

That being said, I'm still incredibly excited to read more of Whitehead's work and am hoping (finally!) to read The Nickel Boys soon! Thanks to Fleet of Little, Brown Book Group for the NetGalley copy in exchange for my honest and unedited review.

“Ingenious story of 1960s NY with colourful characters”

Harlem Shuffle (Hardback) by Colson Whitehead
Harlem Shuffle is a richly evocative portrait of Harlem in the early 1960s. This is a very good thriller, less a novel than three linked novellas with the same protagonist, Ray Carney, the slightly bent owner of a Harlem furniture store. The plots are somewhat intricate and satisfying but it’s the characters, from comic gangsters to crooked bankers to crooked cops, that shine. Even the secondary ones are fully fledged. Referenced in the background are the Harlem riots of 1964 and the emerging civil rights movements. Whitehead writes beautifully and there are some great lines, too. “What made you want to sell couches?” Carney replies: “I’m an entrepreneur.” “‘Entrepreneur?’ Pepper said the last part like manure. ‘That’s just a hustler who pays taxes.’”

I have really enjoyed Colson Whitehead's previous titles, but I found Harlem Shuffle a more difficult read.

Set in the early 1960's, this book charts the story of Ray Carney, a man aspiring to provide for his family from his living as a furniture salesman. However, Carney is not quite the upstanding citizen he would like to be and circumstances (sometimes beyond his control) means that he lives on the fringes of a less desirable crowd and is a small-time criminal, albeit slightly reluctantly.

I loved the descriptions of New York and Harlem and thought that they were well-crafted. I was interested in Carney's story, which started with an exciting robbery. However, the book then meanders through a number of years with many minor characters popping in and out that didn't seem to add to the narrative and were actually quite confusing to keep track of.

Carney is a family man. I loved this about him. He stands up to his judgemental in laws and does the best he can for his family. He supports his cousin, who is a bad judge of character and makes some flawed choices, but Carney still protects and aids him - even when it is against Carney's better judgement,

Lots to enjoy in this so I am glad I read it, but I have enjoyed other titles by this author more.

Colson at his best! A true masterful writer with his ability to turn his hand to any setting or time period and create an atmospheric, engrossing story. Throughout the book we are given senses of the wider social context without being spoon-fed the historical setting. Evocative of its time, Whitehead draws Harlem as an epicentre of Black New York, illustrating the city as a major character alongside our band of thieves and unsuspecting family members. Looking forward to his next book already.

Mike Carney is trying to make a good life for his wife and children from his furniture store that serves the local community in Harlem. While on the surface the business and his life is respectable, Ray's childhood was dominated by his small time crook father and his cousin Freddie. While Ray tried to escape the lifestyle of his father, Freddie hasn't and he pulls Ray into his world. Ray lives two lives - each one supporting the other, with the love of his family at the heart of both.

A fascinating story, transporting the reader to Harlem in the 1950's and 60's.

I was given a copy of Harlem Shuffle by NetGalley and the publishers in return for an unbiased review.

Colson Whitehead is becoming a dependable 'always read' author who guarantees a riveting page turner, from the Underground Railroad to the Nickel Boys and now Harlem Shuffle.

Providing a deep exploration of the black experience in Manhattan in the 1950's for an upwardly mobile furniture salesman - the three phases of the book grab the reader and keep you wanting know how it turns out.

Recommended!