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Sep 28, 2017Novel_Librarian rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
LaValle introduces us to Apollo Kagwa, from the meeting of his parents through to his marriage to Emma and the birth of their child. A moment of extreme violence rips Apollo's family apart and he must set out on a quest through a mythological New York City to reunite them. This novel had beautifully drawn characters and, perhaps even more importantly, beautifully drawn relationships between characters: between Apollo's parents; Apollo and Emma; Apollo and his friend Patrice; even between secondary characters like Patrice and his girlfriend Dana. LaValle fully imagines this world that Apollo is in, including the people. And then, of course, there is the fine rendering of New York - the regular New York, from the 1960s to the present; and the mythological New York, replete with witches and trolls. It's a story that I think will age well while also having very timely considerations woven through it - the effect of technology on anonymity, certainly, but also the way a black man must move through the city in very specific ways. A tremendously satisfying read all the way through. The first half is pretty straightforward literary fiction, while the second half is more fantastical - it will be interesting to see how many fantasy readers will be patient through the first half, and how many literary fiction readers will stay with it after it becomes fantastical. For readers of the increasingly popular subgenre of fairy tale inspired fiction (writers like Helen Oyeyemi, etc).