The World Doesn't Require You: Stories (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781631495380)

Established by the leaders of the country's only successful slave revolt in the mid-nineteenth century, Cross River still evokes the fierce rhythms of its founding. In lyrical prose and singular dialect, a saga beats forward that echoes the fables carried down for generations--like the screecher birds who swoop down for their periodic sacrifice, and the water women who lure men to wet deaths.

Among its residents--wildly spanning decades, perspectives, and species--are David Sherman, a struggling musician who just happens to be God's last son; Tyrone, a ruthless PhD candidate, whose dissertation about a childhood game ignites mayhem in the neighboring, once-segregated town of Port Yooga; and Jim, an all-too-obedient robot who serves his Master. As the book builds to its finish with Special Topics in Loneliness Studies, a fully-realized novella, two unhinged professors grapple with hugely different ambitions, and the reader comes to appreciate the intricacy of the world Scott has created--one where fantasy and reality are eternally at war.

Contemporary and essential, The World Doesn't Require You is a "leap into a blazing new level of brilliance" (Lauren Groff) that affirms Rion Amilcar Scott as a writer whose storytelling gifts the world very much requires.

Author: Rion Amilcar Scott
ISBN-10: 1631495380
ISBN-13: 9781631495380
Publisher: Liveright Publishing Corporation
Language: English
Published: 08/20/2019
Pages: 384
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.20lbs
Size: 9.40h x 6.30w x 1.30d

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal Prepub Alert 03/01/2019 pg. 93
Kirkus Reviews 06/15/2019 pg. 33
Publishers Weekly 06/24/2019
Booklist 07/01/2019 pg. 24
Shelf Awareness 08/23/2019
Library Journal 08/16/2019 pg. 1