An Olive Grove in Ends
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A “vivid, urgent” (Entertainment Weekly) story that follows a young man faced with a fraught decision: escape a dangerous past alone—or brave his old life and keep the woman he loves.
Sayon Hughes longs to escape the volatile Bristol neighborhood known as Ends, the tight-knit but sometimes lawless world in which he was raised, and forge a better life with Shona, the girl he’s loved since grade school. With few paths out, he is drawn into dealing drugs alongside his cousin, the unpredictable but fiercely loyal Cuba. Sayon is on the cusp of making a clean break when an altercation with a rival dealer turns deadly and an expected witness threatens blackmail, upending his plans. Sayon’s loyalties are torn. If Shona learns the secret of his crime, he will lose her forever. But if he doesn’t escape Ends now, he may never get another chance. Is it possible to break free of the bookies’ tickets, burnt spoons, and crooked solutions, and still keep the love of his life? Rippling with authenticity and power, Moses McKenzie’s dazzling debut brings to life a vibrant and teeming world we have read too little about. In its sheer lyrical power, An Olive Grove in Ends recalls the work of James Baldwin and marks the arrival of an exciting and formidable new voice.
One of The Guardian’s Top 10 Debuts of the Year
One of Entertainment Weekly’s Most Anticipated Books of the Summer
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
McKenzie's beautiful debut, set in a predominantly British Jamaican neighborhood of Bristol, England, exhibits both a tenderness for the residents and an unflinching examination of their struggles. Sayon Hughes has fantasized since he was a child about owning a house outside the city. Despite early academic promise, Sayon has grown disillusioned after his school years with the almost impossible project of saving enough money through legitimate means, so, like several of his former classmates and relatives, he's turned to dealing drugs. Then, Sayon kills a man who is assaulting his cousin Cuba. Wracked with guilt and the fear that his longtime girlfriend, Shona Jennings, will split if she finds out, he tries to go straight, moving into Shona's parents' house, only to encounter hypocrisy and cruelty from her pastor father. Questions of faith and its manifestations predominate in the novel's second half, as Sayon grapples with whether to remain in the Christian church of his youth or to start anew with Islam. McKenzie renders the neighborhood's rich and complicated social and familial networks as a study in contrasts, where violence and betrayal coexist with generosity and kindness. It's a gorgeous debut that nurtures an unlikely sort of hope that's predicated on countless losses.
