I wanted to read 'James' ,having read goodreviews, but before that wanted to get a taste of this author as I knew nothing of him. This book blew me away. To read about racial divisions, from a black person's perspective (which is the only way really), just reinforces the lunacy of racism. Its not done in a 'preachy' way but with humour. I am really looking forward now to reading James, knowing a bit more about this authors method of writing. I loved the characters, the snappy dialogue between the detectives, the clichés of small town southern state white racists, and the heartbreak of some of the background stories. It'll stop you in your tracks, this book.

This is a terrific book. It’s a serious topic but very funny and immensely gripping. It starts with a series of brutal murders in a rural town in Mississippi. A pair of hilarious black detectives are drafted in to sort things out. They have to deal with the thick, racist locals, many of whom are members of the KKK, which they do with wit and aplomb. At each crime scene there is a second dead body which resembles the battered corpse of Emmet Till, a young black boy who was lynched in the same town sixty-five years previously. There is a magnificent speech by Trump near the end which is side splittingly authentic. I am off to buy more books by this man.

This is black humour in every sense of the word.... But such black humour as will change your life. A detective novel (some of it very Mr Tibbs) that morphs into The Walking Dead and is suffused with history. And funny. Drily funny. Now I have to read every other book Mr Everett has written.

Everett is a master who can take the same scene and make it comic (almost slapstick?) on one page and intensely devastating on the next. I couldn’t put this down and it had the accessibility and pacing of a crime / detective novel but with much more substance. He makes us face the never-ending racial violence in America - lynchings didn’t stop with Emmett Till by any means.

I could not put this book down. Brilliantly written, fast paced, funny, and thought provoking, this is a book that I am delighted to have found. The incidents described are grotesque but the author brings the characters to vivid life. The Style of the writing and the short chapters keep you turning the pages and make it hard to put down.