The Unsettled
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- 95,00 kr
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- 95,00 kr
Publisher Description
‘[A] powerful book’ Marilynne Robinson
‘A book to be read and re-read’ Jesmyn Ward
‘Poetic and fierce’ Yiyun Li
From the moment Ava Carson and her ten-year-old son, Toussaint, arrive at the Glenn Avenue family shelter in Philadelphia in 1985, Ava is already plotting a way out. Estranged from her own mother, Dutchess, and their home in Bonaparte, Alabama, Ava is determined to give her son
the chance of a better life.
But when Toussaint’s father, Cass, reappears, Ava is swept off course by his charisma and his bold vision for racial justice. As Ava becomes more enmeshed with Cass and the radical group he has created, Toussaint begins to sense the danger and threat of violence simmering all around him. He begins to dream of Dutchess and Bonaparte, his home and birthright, but can he find his way there?
The Unsettled is an explosive and vital story of belonging, legacy and survival from one of America’s most talented storytellers.
‘I can’t remember when I read anything that moved me quite this way, besides the work of Toni Morrison’ Oprah Winfrey on The Twelve Tribes of Hattie
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Mathis (The Twelve Tribes of Hattie) offers a simmering family saga involving fraught efforts in building Black communities. In 1985, Ava Carson and her 10-year-old son, Touissant, are thrown out of their New Jersey home by her husband, Abemi Reed, after Touissant's father, former Black Panther Cass Wright, visited Ava, prompting Abemi to wrongly accuse her of an affair. She's estranged from her mother, Dutchess, and with no money or options, Ava moves with Touissant into a shelter in Philadelphia. Mathis alternates perspectives between Ava and Dutchess, who still lives in Bonaparte, Ala., the historically Black town where Ava grew up. Nobody's left in Bonaparte but Dutchess and four other old-timers, as the town's acreage has dwindled over the years and white folks continue to encroach upon their remaining land. Ava, fed up with the filthy shelter, considers leaving for Bonaparte, but instead runs into Cass, who moves her and Touissant into his communal home where he plans to run a free medical clinic. Despite Cass's allure, his strict rules grate on mother and son, especially after a police raid on the house shatters their calm. Mathis ratchets up the tension all the way to a stunning reveal, which reunites the family members for a reckoning with the truth. Readers won't want to miss Mathis's accomplished return.
