By: Ravi Howard
The town of Mobile, Alabama, in the summer of 1981, when headlines were dominated by the Atlanta child killings, awakens to find a black youth hanging from a neighborhood tree. Sixteen-year-old Roy Deacon, son of the local black funeral director, offers the first-person narrative of his brother Paul's discovery of the body of a friend and classmate, and the town's struggle to reconcile the lynching with any notions that its black residents have of racial progress. Paul has managed to escape the expectations that he will go into the family business, seven generations long. The burden falls all the heavier on Roy, whose distaste doesn't outweigh his strong sense of duty. Looking back 22 years after the event, Roy wrestles with the memory of the lynching at a turning point in the life of the town and his family. Based on the true story of one of the last recorded lynchings in the U.S., Howard's debut novel offers a subtle and stirring look at the complexities of racial hatred and family obligations. Sounce: Booklist
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