NOW A MAJOR TV SERIES BY BARRY JENKINS (COMING MAY 2021) WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION 2017WINNER OF THE ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD 2017LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2017NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER 2016'Whitehead is on a roll: the reviews have been sublime' Guardian'Luminous, furious, wildly inventive' Observer'Hands down one of the best, if not the best, book I've read this year' Stylist 'Dazzling' New York Review of BooksPraised by Barack Obama and an Oprah Book Club Pick, The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead won the National Book Award 2016 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2017.Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. All the slaves lead a hellish existence, but Cora has it worse than most; she is an outcast even among her fellow Africans and she is approaching womanhood, where it is clear even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a slave recently arrived from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they take the perilous decision to escape to the North.In Whitehead's razor-sharp imagining of the antebellum South, the Underground Railroad has assumed a physical form: a dilapidated box car pulled along subterranean tracks by a steam locomotive, picking up fugitives wherever it can. Cora and Caesar's first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But its placid surface masks an infernal scheme designed for its unknowing black inhabitants. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher sent to find Cora, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.At each stop on her journey, Cora encounters a different world. As Whitehead brilliantly recreates the unique terrors for black people in the pre-Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America, from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once the story of one woman's ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shatteringly powerful meditation on history.
CONTRIBUTORS: Colson WhiteheadEAN: 9780349726809COUNTRY: United KingdomPAGES: WEIGHT: 320 gHEIGHT: 196 cm
PUBLISHED BY: Little, Brown Book GroupDATE PUBLISHED: CITY: GENRE: FICTION / GeneralWIDTH: 126 cmSPINE:
Book Themes:
Relating to African American / Black American people, Modern and contemporary fiction: general and literary, History: specific events and topics
It has invaded both my sleeping and waking thoughts . . . Each character feels alive with a singular humanity . . . Whitehead is on a roll, the reviews have been sublime, An engrossing and harrowing novel, [A] brutal, vital, devastating novel...This is a luminous, furious, wildly inventive tale that not only shines a bright light on one of the darkest periods of history, but also opens up thrilling new vistas for the form of the novel itself, This thrilling tale of escape from a deep south plantation takes in terror, beauty and the history of human tragedy..This uncanny novel never attempts to deliver a message - instead it tells one of the most compelling stories I have ever read. Cora's strong, graceful hands touch on the greatest tragedies of our history, It's so good it's hard to praise it without whipping out the cliches: it's an elegant, devastating powerhouse of a book, following a young black woman all over America as she tries to escape the horrors of slavery. When it was published with Oprah's imprimatur, in August, it was universally acclaimed. It deserved it
Colson Whitehead is a multi-award winning and bestselling author whose works include The Nickel Boys, The Underground Railroad, The Noble Hustle, Zone One, Sag Harbor, The Intuitionist, John Henry Days, Apex Hides the Hurt and a collection of essays, The Colossus of New York. He is one of only four novelists to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction twice and is a recipient of MacArthur and Guggenheim fellowships. For The Underground Railroad, Whitehead won the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Fiction, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence and was longlisted for the Booker Prize. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for a second time for The Nickel Boys, which also won the George Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and The Kirkus Prize. The Underground Railroad has been adapted as an Amazon Prime TV series, produced and directed by the Academy Award winning director Barry Jenkins, and was broadcast in 2021. He lives with his family in New York City.
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NOW A MAJOR TV SERIES BY BARRY JENKINS (COMING MAY 2021) WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION 2017WINNER OF THE ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD 2017LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2017NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER 2016'Whitehead is on a roll: the reviews have been sublime' Guardian'Luminous, furious, wildly inventive' Observer'Hands down one of the best, if not the best, book I've read this year' Stylist 'Dazzling' New York Review of BooksPraised by Barack Obama and an Oprah Book Club Pick, The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead won the National Book Award 2016 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2017.Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. All the slaves lead a hellish existence, but Cora has it worse than most; she is an outcast even among her fellow Africans and she is approaching womanhood, where it is clear even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a slave recently arrived from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they take the perilous decision to escape to the North.In Whitehead's razor-sharp imagining of the antebellum South, the Underground Railroad has assumed a physical form: a dilapidated box car pulled along subterranean tracks by a steam locomotive, picking up fugitives wherever it can. Cora and Caesar's first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But its placid surface masks an infernal scheme designed for its unknowing black inhabitants. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher sent to find Cora, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.At each stop on her journey, Cora encounters a different world. As Whitehead brilliantly recreates the unique terrors for black people in the pre-Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America, from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once the story of one woman's ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shatteringly powerful meditation on history.
CONTRIBUTORS: Colson WhiteheadEAN: 9780349726809COUNTRY: United KingdomPAGES: WEIGHT: 320 gHEIGHT: 196 cm
PUBLISHED BY: Little, Brown Book GroupDATE PUBLISHED: CITY: GENRE: FICTION / GeneralWIDTH: 126 cmSPINE:
Book Themes:
Relating to African American / Black American people, Modern and contemporary fiction: general and literary, History: specific events and topics
Colson Whitehead is a multi-award winning and bestselling author whose works include The Nickel Boys, The Underground Railroad, The Noble Hustle, Zone One, Sag Harbor, The Intuitionist, John Henry Days, Apex Hides the Hurt and a collection of essays, The Colossus of New York. He is one of only four novelists to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction twice and is a recipient of MacArthur and Guggenheim fellowships. For The Underground Railroad, Whitehead won the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Fiction, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence and was longlisted for the Booker Prize. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for a second time for The Nickel Boys, which also won the George Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and The Kirkus Prize. The Underground Railroad has been adapted as an Amazon Prime TV series, produced and directed by the Academy Award winning director Barry Jenkins, and was broadcast in 2021. He lives with his family in New York City.
An awesome read that whiled away a long airport layover
Recently I had a 10-hour layover at the Zürich airport. The wintery weather ruined my plans of a visit to the city. Thankfully, I had just bought Mervyn Nel's latest novel in South Africa. This page-turner (like his first novel "Theft from Delos") not only kept me occupied...it engrossed me up to the last surprise-filled chapter!
Although the story-line is quite different from his first novel (despite both revolving around daring heists), it shares the author's signature style of strongly appealing to both the intellect as well as the senses. It is evident that he does meticulous research on all of the settings in his books, so that were you to actually visit Venice (or Delos and the surrounding islands) you would most likely experience a strange sense of déjà vu!
The sensory nature of his books makes them feel/look/smell/sound more like vivid movies. I am convinced that both his books are begging to be turned into fast-paced, edge-of-your-seat motion pictures.
The characters in "The Priest and the Gondolier" leap from the pages of the novel. You definitely feel you want to avoid the "bad guys" in a dark alley! More importantly, the protagonists all have their own unique qualities and charms (my favourite is Chief Superintendent Gina Rossi) and deserve even more elaboration...I think the "The Priest and the Gondolier" most certainly deserves a sequel that will allow Gina Rossi and Harry Wilson (an Interpol art expert) to unravel and resolve a number of very promising sub-plots!
I have been struggling to find books that I enjoy for some time now, especially with fiction. I ordered Finding Endurance on whim, having seen many positive views on the Good Book Appreciation Society's Facebook page, but I thought it might be yet another book that I ditched 100 pages in/100 pages from the end because I really didn't care what happened to the characters. How wrong could I be? I've been obsessed with polar travel for years, but I knew that this book was not going to be another rehash of the amazing Shackleton and his achievements. Well, it blew my hair back, as they say in the classics. Darrel Bristow Bovey has created a masterpiece! It is funny, sad, mind-blowing and the best book I've read in years. It is certainly the best South African book in a VERY long time. I'm telling everyone to read it, as i think everyone will get something out of it. I'm dreading finishing it, and may have to just read it again immediately!