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The Nickel Boys (Paperback)
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Staff Reviews
This is one of the best books I've read this year. Disclosures of a real-life Florida reform school's long-standing corruption and abusive practices inspired Whitehead's new novel. It's the early 1960's, and idealistic Elmwood and cynical Turner are both "Students" at The Nickel Academy in Tallahassee. The book is divided into three sections, detailing Elwood's life beore, during, and after his time at the Nickel Academy. This is not a particularly easy read, but it is a necessary read. It's a story of survival, and trying to hold onto a sense of personhood, written in a sharp and amazing language.
— ChrisAugust 2019 Indie Next List
“With every book, Colson Whitehead proves his ever-growing genius. He’s a master of the written word and truly one of the greatest living American novelists of our time. I didn’t think it was possible for him to write something better than Underground Railroad, but he most certainly has — The Nickel Boys grabbed me at page one. It’s a mystery and a thriller, a treatise on race and social injustice, and a literary masterpiece all rolled into one. Ellwood and Turner are characters that will stay with me forever. This should be mandatory reading in every classroom.”
— Michelle Malonzo, Changing Hands, Tempe, AZ
Winter 2020 Reading Group Indie Next List
“The Nickel Boys is more proof that Colson Whitehead is an essential American author. Based on the true story of Florida’s infamous Dozier School for Boys, in The Nickel Boys, Whitehead continues his reckoning with the violence endured by African Americans, which he began with The Underground Railroad. The Nickel Boys is a bare, unvarnished, and unblinking coming-of-age tale set against the backdrop of the Jim Crow South and an all-too-real horror from our nation’s history. It’s a story that must be told by the only writer who can tell it.”
— Keaton Patterson, Brazos Bookstore, Houston, TX