alfred e.

Based upon an actual reform school in mid-twentieth century Florida, the Nickel Academy is the setting of Colson Whitehead's horrifying tale of racial injustice and abuse which represents nothing less than the American counterpart to the Siberian gulags denounced by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn in his own writings. The reader is quickly plunged into Elwood Curtis' Kafkaesque nightmare springing from his arrest on totally spurious grounds. But beware : Whitehead does not cede to facile fantasies of black rage, for Elwood's unsinkable idealism is based upon Reverend King's calls for loving one's enemies. This moral paradox is a dual-edged sword of uncertain worth, lest one forget King's vision of the long arc of history, no matter how Elwood's companion in suffering Turner feels about the legitimacy of loving one's enemies to death. Haunting and thought-provoking, a future classic.

Susan Choi's 'Trust Exercise' is that rare novel which keeps the reader guessing in terms of plotting and character depiction in her story of high school pupils in the Deep South of the 1980s. Under the iron rule of the charismatic yet intimidating Mr Kingsley, the various teen protagonists find themselves propelled into trajectories beyond their control leaving indelible marks on their future lives far away from the Citywide Academy for the Performing Arts. 'Trust Exercise' calls into question with conviction the trust young people are expected to place in adult mentors and instructors who themselves have failed to transcend certain foibles of their teen years. A worthwhile and mesmerizing read.