Vendor
	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Annelie Geissler
Categories
Biography, Literature & Literary studies

DON'T CRY FOR ME

Daniel Black

A Black father makes amends with his gay son through letters written on his deathbed in this wise and penetrating novel of empathy and forgiveness, for fans of Ta-Nehisi Coates, Robert Jones Jr. and Alice Walker.

As Jacob lays dying, he begins to write a letter to his only son Isaac. They have not met or spoken in many years, and there are things that Isaac must know. Stories about his ancestral legacy in rural Arkansas that extends back to slavery. Secrets from Jacob's tumultuous relationship with Isaac's mother and the shame he carries from the dissolution of their family. Tragedies that informed Jacob's role as a father and his reaction to Isaac being gay. But most of all, Jacob must share with Isaac the unspoken truths that reside in his heart. He must give voice to the trauma that Isaac has inherited. And he must create a space for the two to find peace. With piercing insight and profound empathy, acclaimed author Daniel Black gives voice to the lived experiences of Black fathers and queer sons, offering an authentic and ultimately hopeful portrait of reckoning and reconciliation. Spare as it is sweeping, poetic as it is compulsively readable, DON'T CRY FOR ME is a monumental novel about one family grappling with love's hard edges and the unexpected places where hope and healing take flight. Daniel Black is professor of African American Studies at Clark Atlanta University. He is author of 6 novels, among them Perfect Peace--the story of a black male child raised as a girl--and The Coming--the story of an enslaved African group during the treacherous Middle Passage. A new title, Don't Cry for Me, is forthcoming as is a new non-fiction title, Black on Black. Daniel is a much-sought-after public speaker and corporate trainer in race and gender relations. His newest short story, "Miss Loretha's Last Stand", appears in Viral Literature: Alone Together in Georgia (2020).

Available products
Book Published 2022-02-01 by Hanover Square Press

Comments

DON'T CRY FOR ME was named a most anticipated book by Essence, The Millions, and Bookish, and was a Book of the Month Club Pick.

This moving read....is an insightful peek into how the elderly might regard their place in a changing world.

You'll need to pull out the tissues for this beautiful text about fatherhood, vulnerability, failure, and unconditional love.

Heartbreaking... Poignant and moving...consistently powerful.

A deeply perceptive evocation of what it has meant to be a man and especially a Black man in the United States, all the more affecting for not being shouted out but told with quiet, sturdy intimacy.

DON'T CRY FOR ME shows Daniel Black at the top of his writerly craft. In this painful yet profound novel, Black forces us to grapple with our deepest male fears, pains, taboos, and desires. At the same time, he dares us to imagine new and freer selves. This magical text is one of the most beautiful and important books of this young century.

Sad and gripping... an example of how fiction is not just a form of literature but a place. We go there for lessons on how to live, how to change and, most important, how to forgive and seek forgiveness.

DON'T CRY FOR ME is literally the book my favorite books needed to read. It is an unparalleled literary achievement that already feels like it will, of all things, endure.

While the story is an unflinching account of a family and a community in the Black American Midwest coming of age in the modern now, it is also full of that which makes us all human, regardless of where we are from or who we are: full of fathers trying to understand sons, sons trying to understand fathers, parents feeling as if they have failed children, children realizing how they have passed their own traumas on to others and so on. It's a beautiful book. Read it.

Incredible storytelling, and readers will be invested from page one... An accomplished author of six previous novels, Black has crafted a memorable, poignant story that explores themes of regret, legacy and family - and yet remains perfectly balanced through it all.

A revealing ode to a son from a father seeking forgiveness... Embedded in this impactful story about one man's experience growing up Black in America is an examination of the changing definition of masculinity and how it influences his ability to relate to his gay son.