A family struggles to stay together in this dynamic autobiographical novel, set on the mean streets of '90s Northeast Portland and told in one of the freshest debut voices in recent years.
Mitchell S. Jackson grew up black in a neglected neighborhood in America's whitest city, Portland, Oregon. In the '90s, those streets and beyond had fallen under the shadow of crack cocaine and its familiar mayhem. In his commanding debut autobiographical novel, Mitchell writes what it was to come of age in that time and place, with a breakout voice that's nothing less than extraordinary.
The Residue Years switches between the perspectives of a young man, Champ, and his mother, Grace. Grace is just out of a drug treatment program, trying to stay clean and get her kids back. Champ is trying to do right by his mom and younger brothers, and dreams of reclaiming the only home he and his family have ever shared. But selling crack is the only sure way he knows to achieve his dream. In this world of few options and little opportunity, where love is your strength and your weakness, this family fights for family and against what tears one apart.
Read Caroline Baum's Review
Is there anything more poignant to read about than doomed hope?
Meet Grace and her son Champ. Grace is just out of a drug treatment program, trying to find a job, stay clean and get back on her feet while Champ dreams only of reclaiming the family home - and is selling crack to make his dream come true. It’s a harrowing tale of America’s underbelly, of such bleakness that you might be forgiven for turning away were it not for the writer’s sparkling prose which becomes, well, addictive. You just can’t turn away from those cadences, those sentences that build their rhythm like a spell around you.
They make you care about Grace and Champ till it hurts.
Readers who enjoyed the raw vibe of Omar Musa’s Here Come the Dogs and Jesmyn Ward’s devastating memoir Men We Reaped will recognise much of the territory and the themes of this stunning debut: the failed hoop dreams, racism, and society destroyed by a drug war which no one can win.
Out of this despair, Jackson, who grew up black in a neglected neighbourhood of America’s whitest city, Portland, Oregon, forges something of commanding beauty and strength making it impossible to look away.
About the Author
Mitchell S. Jackson was born and raised in Portland. He holds a masters of writing from Portland State University and an M.F.A. from New York University. He teaches writing at NYU, Medgar Evers College, and John Jay College, and also works as a journalist, writing about rap for Vibe, the Source, and others. He is a winner of the Hurston Wright Award for College Writers and a fellowship at the Center for Fiction. He is also the author of the ebook Oversoul. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Industry Reviews
A fresh new voice in fiction. O, The Oprah Magazine Jackson's poetic prose is a joy to read ... The ways mother and son grapple with social judgment and limited choices are provocative and timely. Booklist I was touched by characters whose lives were often as real for me as my memories of growing up. The language invented to tell their stories engages, challenges, clarifies the American language, claiming it, enlarging it. John Edgar Wideman, author of Fanon, Philadelphia Fire, and Brothers and Keepers A writer to be reckoned with; The Residue Years marks the beginning of a most promising career. Jesmyn Ward, author of Salvage the Bones and Men We Reaped This is a memorable, powerful novel and Mitchell S. Jackson is a genuine talent. Victor LaValle, author of The Devil in Silver
