Overview

"From ""one of the most original minds in contemporary literature"" (Nick Hornby) the bestselling and award-winning author of Golden Hill delivers a noirish detective novel set in the 1920s that reimagines how American history would be different if, instead of being decimated, indigenous populations had thrived.Like his earlier novel Golden Hill, Francis Spufford's Cahokia Jazz inhabits a different version of America, now through the lens of a subtly altered 1920s--a fully imagined world full of fog, cigarette smoke, dubious motives, danger, dark deeds. And in the main character of Joe Barrow, we have a hero of truly epic proportions, a troubled soul to fall in love with as you are swept along by a propulsive and brilliantly twisty plot. On a snowy night at the end of winter, Barrow and his partner find a body on the roof of a skyscraper. Down below, streetcar bells ring, factory whistles blow, Americans drink in speakeasies and dance to the tempo of modern times. But this is Cahokia, the ancient indigenous city beside the Mississippi living on as a teeming industrial metropolis, filled with people of every race and creed. Among them, peace holds. Just about. But that corpse on the roof will spark a week of drama in which this altered world will spill its secrets and be brought, against a soundtrack of jazz clarinets and wailing streetcars, either to destruction or rebirth."

Full Product Details

9781797167947

Table of Contents

Reviews

Author Information

Francis Spufford began as the author of four highly praised books of nonfiction. His first book, I May Be Some Time, won the Writers' Guild Award for Best Nonfiction Book of 1996, the Banff Mountain Book Prize, and a Somerset Maugham Award. It was followed by The Child That Books Built, Backroom Boys, and most recently, Unapologetic. But with Red Plenty in 2012 he switched to the novel. Golden Hill won multiple literary prizes on both sides of the Atlantic; Light Perpetual was longlisted for the Booker Prize. In England he is a Fellow of both the Royal Society of Literature and the Royal Historical Society. He teaches writing at Goldsmiths College, University of London. Andy Ingalls is an award-winning actor and narrator originally from Houston, Texas, and now based in New York, where he recently received his MFA from NYU Tisch's Grad Acting program. Some of his recent favorite roles have been: Sam Phillips in the International Tour of Million Dollar Quartet, Lord Aster in the National Tour of Peter and the Starcatcher, Guildenstern in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (dir. Arin Arbus), Beautrix in the world premiere of 'Tis Pity She's a Housewife (dir. Stevie Walker-Webb), The Archbishop of Canterbury in Charles III (dir. Mark Wing-Davey), Anton Chekhov in Love, Anton (Griffin Theatre), as well as development of new plays with New York Stage and Film, Clubbed Thumb, The Director's Company, Naked Angels, Primary Stages, and the Dorset Theatre Festival. Andy is also proud to be the founder and artistic director of the Round Robin, an ongoing Shakespeare project in New York.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available