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.
"Dazzling . . . an intricate, suspenseful and moving story that
rises from the mists of America's prehistory and morphs into an
alternate version of America's story. . . . [Spufford] keeps his
engine running with action and intrigue, romance and suspense, and
his sense of place is spellbinding . . . Cahokia Jazz is an
audacious work of the imagination by an author powerfully steeped
in mythmaking." --The Los Angeles Times "Atmospheric . . .
Spufford, one of our most powerful writers of wayward historical
fiction, sets his book--a hard-boiled crime story--in an America
that's recognizable yet disquietingly not. . . . In the compelling
character of Barrow--a mostly decent man trying to make sense of a
fallen 'what if' world--many of us will recognize our own
held-breath bafflement, caught, as we are, on the darkling plain of
our own barely believable times." --Maureen Corrigan, The
Washington Post "A smoky, brooding noir set in the 1920s, but not
an entirely recognizable 1920s . . . Cahokia Jazz combines the
intricate plot and burly action of an old-fashioned hardboiled
detective novel with Spufford's dreamy, lustrous prose, summoning
an irresistible city lost to time and chance." --Laura Milller,
Slate "Cahokia Jazz is a love letter--not just to an America that
might have been, but to a national mythology that's very much alive
in the world as it is." --Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal "In this
stylishly drawn mystery novel, the tropes of noir--among them a
hardboiled detective with an artist's soul, a powerful woman with a
terrible secret, and a journalist chasing the story of a
lifetime--appear in an alternative Jazz Age." --New Yorker
"Magical . . . a gripping rollercoaster, which fulfills all the
demand of the noir form to which it pays homage and, like all the
best alt-history, throws a fascinating light onto 'real' history."
--Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the
Night-Time "Energetic and hugely enjoyable." --The Guardian, Best
Fiction of 2023 "A marvellous deep-layered tale of treachery and
trickery." --Independent "Arresting . . . a gorgeously rich and
multilayered story, packed with gunfire, music and superstition. .
. . Cahokia Jazz is enormous fun, and the closest contemporary
novel like it is Colson Whitehead's magnificent The Underground
Railroad. . . . Barrow is a terrific action hero." --The Spectator
"Told in prose as intoxicating as a swig of bathtub gin, this 1920s
gumshoe novel takes place in the fictional city of Cahokia where
indigenous people are major players in the tenuous peace that rules
the city. That is, until a body appears butchered atop a
skyscraper, arranged in a way that appears to be a symbolic
message. When an outcast detective and his partner are put on the
case, wheels start turning in gasp-inducing twists through the very
last page."--Good Housekeeping, Most Anticipated Books of 2024 "A
richly entertaining take on the crime story, and a country that
might've been."--Kirkus (starred review) "[A] thrilling leap into
alternative history . . . a murder mystery that doesn't let up . .
. Like the city and world it depicts, this is a complicated book
that offers many layers of pleasure. . . . Above all, there's the
joy that comes from seeing a profusion of love and care poured into
a fully original piece of work." --Financial Times "Gutsy and
atmospheric . . . [a] generous slice of noir." --Mail on Sunday "A
rich and fluently imagined alternate history . . . vivid and varied
. . . Spufford's skill at keeping you reading, sentence after
sentence, is for me up there with writers like David Mitchell."
--Locus Magazine "Sure to be one of the most distinctly imagined
texts of the year, in any genre." --Crime Reads
"Francis Spufford is a literary sorcerer with one of the great
imaginations of our time. When a new book lands, I drop everything
and start reading. Cahokia Jazz takes us to an America that
wasn't... a wilder, richer, altogether more enchanting America.
Bullets and beatings provide the percussion to Spufford's hothouse
jazz noir, while hope and heartbreak do a dizzying, drunken foxtrot
together. I can't remember the last time suspense and spiritual
longing were so tightly braided together in a single novel. A
masterpiece." --Joe Hill "Stylish and ambitious ... [Spufford's]
most crowd-pleasing novel yet." --The Times "A taut, unguessable
whuddunit, painted in ultrablack noir. . . . It's got gorgeously
described jazz music, a richly realized modern indigenous society,
and a spectacular romance. . . . amazing . . . a book that fires on
every cylinder." --Cory Doctorow "The book is itself Cahokia jazz;
the play of possibilities beyond the linear progression of the tune
we all already know, that goes to wild places and then winds back,
beautifully, heartbreakingly, to echo the notes of where it
started." --Jo Baker, bestselling author of Longbourn "Cahokia Jazz
is a delight." --Sunday Telegraph "Francis Spufford has discovered
a new riff on a favorite tune, and in exploring it has created
something wholly unique. Cahokia Jazz is extraordinary." --Mick
Herron, author of Slow Horses
"A vibrant thriller set in an alternative history . . . ambitious
and consequential. Spufford's prose is energetic and rhythmic, yet
his theme--namely racial politics in the US today--couldn't be
weightier." --New Statesman "This richly imagined and densely
plotted story refreshes the crime genre and acts as a fun house
mirror reflection of contemporary attitudes toward race--all set to
a thumping jazz age soundtrack. Standing alongside Orson Scott
Card's Alvin Maker series and Michael Chabon's The Yiddish
Policemen's Union, this is a challenging evocation of an America
that never was." --Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Cahokia Jazz
is a novel about finding one's place in the world. It is haunting,
wholly memorable, and will leave you with an ache." --Times
Literary Supplement "One of the signal achievements of this
exceptional novel is the generosity and rigour with which it
conjures up Cahokia. Spufford's creation absolutely feels like a
place you could visit, or could have visited, if you happened to be
travelling westward across the United States in the year of
modernism, 1922. . . . As a piece of narrative entertainment,
Cahokia Jazz is more or less unimprovable." --Irish Times "Gritty.
. . . Spufford has written an astounding homage to noir mysteries.
A poignant drama-filled novel that his fans and readers of Cormac
McCarthy's Blood Meridian will thoroughly enjoy." --Library Journal
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