Publications

Fiction

FOREIGNERS, THREE ENGLISH LIVES - Fall 2007

Foreigners

Harvill Secker (UK); Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 2007

From "one of the literary giants of our times" (The New York Times)—a brilliant hybrid of reportage, fiction, and historical fact that tells the stories of three black men whose tragic lives speak resoundingly to the place and role of the foreigner in English society.

DANCING IN THE DARK

Dancing in the Dark

Secker and Warburg (UK); Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 2005

A searing novel that reimagines the remarkable, tragic, little-known life of Bert Williams (1874—1922), the first black entertainer in the United States to reach the highest levels of fame and fortune.

A DISTANT SHORE

A Distant Shore

Secker and Warburg (UK); Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 2003

Set in contemporary England, A Distant Shore is the story of an African man and an English woman whose hidden lives, and worlds, are revealed in their fragile, fateful connection. Finalist for the 2003 PEN/Faulkner Award.

THE NATURE OF BLOOD

The Nature of Blood

Faber and Faber (UK); Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 1997

At the center of The Nature of Blood is a young woman, a Nazi death camp survivor, devastated by the loss of everyone she loves.

CROSSING THE RIVER

Crossing the River

Bloomsbury (UK), 1993; Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 1994

An evocation of the scattered offspring of Africa. A voice speaking out of a distant past describes the consequences of his desperation: his daughter and two sons condemned to the hold of an English slave ship bound for America in 1753.

CAMBRIDGE

Cambridge

Bloomsbury (UK), 1991; Alfred A. Knopf (USA), 1992

Cambridge is a devoutly Christian slave in the West Indies whose sense of justice is both profound and self-destructive, while Emily is a morally-blind, genteel Englishwoman.

HIGHER GROUND

Higher Ground

Viking (UK & USA), 1989

In Africa, a man recounts his days within the grinding machine of the slave trade. Though spared manacles and a hellish ocean crossing by assisting in the degrading business, he is forced finally to confront an inescapable, vicious paradox: in the eyes of both his masters and his own people he is a pariah—less than a man.

A STATE OF INDEPENDENCE

A State of Independence

Faber and Faber (UK); Farrar, Straus & Giroux (USA), 1986

Bertram Francis is a British West Indian who has spent the last twenty years away from the Caribbean. Now Independence is looming and he is going back to see the end of colonial rule.

THE FINAL PASSAGE

The Final Passage

Faber and Faber (UK); Penguin (USA), 1985

A haunting work about "the final passage"—the exodus of black West Indians from their impoverished islands to the uncertain opportunities of England.

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