A triumphant, genre-bending breakout novel from one of the boldest new voices in contemporary fiction Vern--seven months pregnant and desperate to escape the strict religious compound where she was raised--flees for the shelter of the woods. There, she gives birth to twins, and plans to raise them far from the influence of the outside world. But even in the forest, Vern is a hunted woman. Forced to fight back against the community that refuses to let her go, she unleashes incredible brutality far beyond what a person should be capable of, her body wracked by inexplicable and uncanny changes. To understand her metamorphosis and to protect her small family, Vern has to face the past, and more troublingly, the future--outside the woods. Finding the truth will mean uncovering the secrets of the compound she fled but also the violent history in America that produced it. Rivers Solomon'sSorrowland is a genre-bending work of Gothic fiction. Here, monsters aren't just individuals, but entire nations. It is a searing, seminal book that marks the arrival of a bold, unignorable voice in American fiction.

Sorrowland: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

Solomon, Rivers

United States

Welcome to Rivers Solomon's dark and wondrous Model Home, a new kind of haunted-house novel. The three Maxwell siblings keep their distance from the lily-white gated enclave outside Dallas where they grew up. When their family moved there, they were the only Black family in the neighborhood. The neighbors acted nice enough, but right away bad things, scary things--the strange and the unexplainable--began to happen in their house. Maybe it was some cosmic trial, a demonic rite of passage into the upper-middle class. Whatever it was, the Maxwells, steered by their formidable mother, stayed put, unwilling to abandon their home, terrors and trauma be damned. As adults, the siblings could finally get away from the horrors of home, leaving their parents all alone in the house. But when news of their parents' death arrives, Ezri is forced to return to Texas with their sisters, Eve and Emanuelle, to reckon with their family's past and present, and to find out what happened while they were away. It was not a "natural" death for their parents . . . but was it supernatural? Rivers Solomon turns the haunted-house story on its head, unearthing the dark legacies of segregation and racism in the suburban American South. Unbridled, raw, and daring, Model Home is the story of secret histories uncovered, and of a queer family battling for their right to live, grieve, and heal amid the terrors of contemporary American life.

Model Home: A Novel

Literary

Picador

"Narrator Karen Chilton gives a riveting performance in this genre-defying masterpiece...The echoes of Chilton's haunting and beautiful narration will reverberate long after this powerful audiobook is over." -- AudioFile Magazine A triumphant, genre-bending breakout novel from one of the boldest new voices in contemporary fiction Vern--seven months pregnant and desperate to escape the strict religious compound where she was raised--flees for the shelter of the woods. There, she gives birth to twins, and plans to raise them far from the influence of the outside world. But even in the forest, Vern is a hunted woman. Forced to fight back against the community that refuses to let her go, she unleashes incredible brutality far beyond what a person should be capable of, her body wracked by inexplicable and uncanny changes. To understand her metamorphosis and to protect her small family, Vern has to face the past, and more troublingly, the future--outside the woods. Finding the truth will mean uncovering the secrets of the compound she fled but also the violent history in America that produced it. Rivers Solomon's Sorrowland is a genre-bending work of Gothic fiction. Here, monsters aren't just individuals, but entire nations. It is a searing, seminal book that marks the arrival of a bold, unignorable voice in American fiction. A Macmillan Audio production from MCD

MacMillan Audio

About the Author\nRivers Solomonwrites about life in the margins, where they are much at home. In addition to appearing on the Stonewall Honor List and winning a Firecracker Award, Solomon's debut novel An Unkindness of Ghosts was a finalist for a Lambda, a Hurston/Wright, an Otherwise (formerly Tiptree) and a Locus award. Solomon's second book, The Deep, based on the Hugo-nominated song by Daveed Diggs-fronted hip-hop group clipping, was the winner of the 2020 Lambda Award and shortlisted for a Nebula, Locus, Hugo, Ignyte, Brooklyn Library Literary, British Fantasy, and World Fantasy award. Solomon's short work appears in Black Warrior Review, The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, Guernica, Best American Short Stories, Tor.com, Best American Horror and Dark Fantasy, and elsewhere. A refugee of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade, Solomon was born on Turtle Island but currently resides on an isle in an archipelago off the western coast of the Eurasian continent.\nA TIME 100 Must-Read Book of 2021\nA New York Times Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Book of 2021\nThe Stonewall Book Award winner of 2022\nNamed a Best Book of 2021 by NPR, The New York Public Library, Publishers Weekly and more!\nA triumphant, genre-bending breakout novel from one of the boldest new voices in contemporary fiction.\nVern―seven months pregnant and desperate to escape the strict religious compound where she was raised―flees for the shelter of the woods. There, she gives birth to twins and plans to raise them far from the influence of the outside world.\nBut even in the forest, Vern is a hunted woman. Forced to fight back against the community that refuses to let her go, she unleashes incredible brutality far beyond what a person should be capable of, her body wracked by inexplicable and uncanny changes.\nTo understand her metamorphosis and to protect her small family, Vern has to face the past and, more troublingly, the future―outside the woods. Finding the truth will mean uncovering not only the secrets of the compound she fled but also the violent history of America that produced it.\nRivers Solomon’s Sorrowland is a genre-bending work of gothic fiction. Here, monsters aren’t just individuals but entire nations. This is a searing, seminal book that marks the arrival of a bold, unignorable voice in American fiction.

Sorrowland

Picador Paper

'Sorrowland is a wonderland of fantastical and frightening, magical and real. At the centre of this world and leaping off the page is Vern: unstoppable, unforgettable, and unlike anyone you have ever seen before.' MARLON JAMES, Booker Prize-winning author\n'A fantastical, fierce reckoning ... Sorrowland is gorgeous, and the writing, the storytelling, are magnificent. This country has a dark history of what it's willing to do to black bodies, and Rivers Solomon lays that truth bare in a most unexpected, absolutely brilliant way.' ROXANE GAY\nChosen as a 'Book of the Month' in the Guardian 
_________________________________________ 
A triumphant, genre-bending novel, following a y oung woman through a nightmarish yet recognisable landscape as she attempts to create a new life for herself and her children.\nVern, a hunted woman alone in the woods, gives birth to twins and raises them away from the influence of the outside world. But something is wrong - not with them, but with her own body. It's changing, it's stronger, it's not normal.\nTo understand her body's metamorphosis, Vern must investigate the secluded religious compound from which she fled and the violent history of dehumanisation, medical experimentation and that produced it. In the course of reclaiming her own darkness, Vern learns that monsters aren't just individuals, but entire histories, systems and nations.\nRivers Solomon's Sorrowland is a memorable work of Gothic fiction that wrestles with the tangled history of racism in America and the marginalisation of society's undesirables. It is a searing, seminal book that marks the arrival of a bold, unignorable voice in American fiction. 
_________________________________________\n'Joyful and wildly entertaining' Guardian\n'Dark, magical, and incredibly satisfying'Independent

Contemporary

Merky Books

Amazon.com Review An Amazon Best Book of May 2021: Rivers Solomon’s writing talent comes on like a firehose in this genre-bending Gothic tale. When Vern flees Cainland, the religious cult where she was raised, she is pregnant and desperate, but she might also finally be on the path to freedom. She gives birth to twins, raising them deep in the forest, until a confrontation with a being she calls “the fiend”—who has been haunting her for years—drives her to leave the forest and seek answers about her past. You will not meet a more memorable protagonist than Vern; this young Black albino intersex mother lights up the novel. So does Rivers Solomon’s writing. Sorrowland is literature, horror, and fantasy—and the ideas and imagery packed into this book could fill half a dozen other novels. At times, it felt like Solomon was only just holding on to the reins of the story, and as a reader I found it thrilling to discover where that could lead. —Chris Schluep, Amazon Book Review Product Description 'Sorrowlandis a wonderland of fantastical and frightening, magical and real. At the centre of this world and leaping off the page is Vern: unstoppable, unforgettable, and unlike anyone you have ever seen before.' MARLON JAMES, Booker Prize-winning author'A fantastical, fierce reckoning ... Sorrowland is gorgeous, and the writing, the storytelling, are magnificent. This country has a dark history of what it's willing to do to black bodies, and Rivers Solomon lays that truth bare in a most unexpected, absolutely brilliant way.' ROXANE GAY__________________________Vern, a Black woman with albinism, is hunted after escaping a religious compound, then she discovers that her body is changing and that she is developing extra-sensory powers.Alone in the woods, she gives birth to twins and raises them away from the influence of the outside world. But something is wrong - not with them, but with her own body. It's itching, it's stronger, it's... not normal.To understand her body's metamorphosis, Vern must investigate not just the secluded religious compound she fled but the violent history of dehumanisation, medical experimentation, and that produced it. In the course of reclaiming her own darkness, Vern learns that monsters aren't just individuals, but entire histories, systems, and nations.__________________________

Cornerstone

WINNER OF THE LAMBDA LITERARY LGBTQ SCIENCE FICTION/FANTASY/HORROR AWARD\nThe water-breathing descendants of African slave women tossed overboard have built their own underwater society-and must reclaim the memories of their past to shape their future in this brilliantly imaginative novella inspired by the Hugo Award-nominated song "The Deep" from Daveed Diggs's rap group clipping.\nYetu holds the memories for her people-water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard by slave owners-who live idyllic lives in the deep. Their past, too traumatic to be remembered regularly, is forgotten by everyone, save one-the historian. This demanding role has been bestowed on Yetu.\nYetu remembers for everyone, and the memories, painful and wonderful, traumatic and terrible and miraculous, are destroying her. And so, she flees to the surface, escaping the memories, the expectations, and the responsibilities-and discovers a world her people left behind long ago.\nYetu will learn more than she ever expected to about her own past-and about the future of her people. If they are all to survive, they'll need to reclaim the memories, reclaim their identity-and own who they really are.\nInspired by a song produced by the rap group Clipping for the This American Life episode "We Are In The Future," The Deep is vividly original and uniquely affecting.

The Deep

Diggs, Daveed

Hutson, William

Snipes, Jonathan

Genre Fiction

Hodderscape

Amazon.com Review\nEditors' pick: Solomon spins out a heart-snatching story about the weight and redemption of memory."—Adrian Liang, Amazon Editor

Hodder&Stoughton

ONE OF NPR’S BEST BOOKS OF 2019 The water-breathing descendants of African slave women tossed overboard have built their own underwater society—and must reclaim the memories of their past to shape their future in this brilliantly imaginative novella inspired by the Hugo Award–nominated song “The Deep” from Daveed Diggs’s rap group clipping Yetu holds the memories for her people—water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard by slave owners—who live idyllic lives in the deep. Their past, too traumatic to be remembered regularly, is forgotten by everyone, save one—the historian. This demanding role has been bestowed on Yetu. Yetu remembers for everyone, and the memories, painful and wonderful, traumatic and terrible and miraculous, are destroying her. And so, she flees to the surface, escaping the memories, the expectations, and the responsibilities—and discovers a world her people left behind long ago. Yetu will learn more than she ever expected to about her own past—and about the future of her people. If they are all to survive, they’ll need to reclaim the memories, reclaim their identity—and own who they really are. Inspired by a song produced by the rap group Clipping for the This American Life episode “We Are In The Future,” The Deep is vividly original and uniquely affecting.

S&S/Saga Press

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Books by Solomon, Rivers

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Solomon, Rivers. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Sorrowland: A Novel

Model Home: A Novel

Model Home: A Novel

Sorrowland: A Novel

Sorrowland

Sorrowland

Sorrowland

The Deep

The Deep

The Deep