The first complete paperback edition of a nearly lost treasure of African American literature set in Jazz Age Kansas City, Missouri and told through the eyes of a remarkable boy
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‘A vibrant portrait of African-American life at the nation's crossroads … but the novel's real achievement is in its evocation of Amerigo Jones's childhood and his interaction with his parents, Rutherford and Viola, themselves only teenagers when their son's life begins … Such Sweet Thunder belongs with other enduring documentaries of the dispossessed, like Cormac Mc Carthy's Suttree or Langston Hughes's novel Not Without Laughter’ The New York Times Book Review
‘A rousing, inspired work, keenly observed and soulful … The novel sparkles with life, soaring with the loose flow of a jazzy improvisation. More akin in style to Charles Dickens than Richard Wright or James Baldwin, Carter writes prose that tingles with detail … a rich addition to our literary understanding of the 20th-century African-American experience’ The Boston Globe
‘A colossal work of fiction … Sprawling and searching, it is Dickensian or even Joycean in scope … This novel is not only a Bildungsroman but also a road map – an atlas that points the way to both the heartland and the human heart’ The Kansas City Star
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Such Sweet Thunder immerses readers in the life of a precocious infant, Amerigo Jones, and then tells the story of his first eighteen years as he becomes aware of the world, starts school, then begins to learn about and experience adult issues, from racism and crime to falling in love.
All the while, in one of the most moving homages to parents ever to appear in literature, Amerigo is protected by Viola and Rutherford, who are loving and, mostly, even-tempered, but also desperately young – teenagers themselves when Amerigo is born – and poor. With a new foreword by Jesse Mc Carthy, Carter's literary masterpiece is poised to take its rightful place in the American literary canon.
About the author
Jesse Mc Carthy is an essayist, cultural critic, and the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities and of the Social Sciences at Harvard University. His writing on culture and politics has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The Nation, Dissent, The New Republic and n+1. In 2022 he was the recipient of the Whiting Award for his essay collection Who Will Pay Reparations on My Soul?. His most recent book, The Blue Period, establishes Such Sweet Thunder as a work to be read and taught alongside those of James Baldwin and Ralph Ellison.
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