Published by PAN MACMILLAN, 2016, SOFTCOVER, 288 PAGES, CONDITION: AS NEW.
Born in the 'agrarian ghetto' of Dickens - on the southern outskirts of Los Angeles - the narrator of The Sellout is raised by a single father, a controversial sociologist, and spends his childhood as the subject in racially charged psychological studies. Led to believe his father's pioneering work will result in a memoir that will solve his family's financial woes, he is shocked to discover, when his father is killed in a police shoot-out, that there never was a memoir. All that's left is a bill for a drive-through funeral.Fuelled by this deceit and the general disrepair of his hometown, the narrator sets out to right another wrong: Dickens has literally been removed from the map to save California from embarrassment. Enlisting the help of Dickens' most famous resident - Hominy Jenkins - he initiates the most outrageous action conceivable: reinstating slavery and segregating the local high school. What follows is a remarkable journey that challenges the sacred tenets of the United States Constitution, urban life, the civil rights movement and the holy grail of racial equality - the black Chinese restaurant.
If Kurt Vonnegut and Dave Chappelle had a baby and really messed with its head, it would write this novel. I hope Paul Beatty takes that as a compliment because it's meant that way.
This is some seriously biting satire. You know it right away, since it begins with the main character, a black man, before the Supreme Court because he's charged with keeping a slave. Most of the novel is a flashback, showing us how the protagonist not only kept a slave but attempted to re-segregate his formerly all-black now mostly hispanic city. Yes, it sounds crazy. It sounds even crazier because the narrator isn't a racist crazy person, but a relatively enlightened guy who's decided this is how he gets his city back on the map.
It's a zany book, a constant study of and commentary on race. It's often hilarious and not for the faint of heart or tired of mind. I had a great time reading it, but I admit now I'm hesitant to know how to talk about it. So much in this book is untouchable and off limits and taboo. It's also brilliant and constantly unexpected.
