When Preston Downs, Jr., alias Prez, slides down the emergency
chute onto the frozen tarmac at the Montreal airport, little does
he know that returning home to Washington D.C. or to his adopted
city, Chicago, would now be impossible. Events had sped by after a
dust-up with the Chicago police. With a new name and papers, he
finds himself in a foreign city where people speak French and life
is douce compared to the one he fled.Son of a World War II vet,
Prez grows up in the 50s in D.C., a segregated Southern city, and
learns early that black lives don't much matter. As a leader in the
streets, his journey from boyhood to manhood means acquiring
fighting skills to lead and unify long before losing his virginity.
Smart and skeptical, but with a code of ethics, he, like every
black kid, wants to be Malcolm, Martin or at least a "soul
brother," which inspires fear among the powers that be.Spotted
while an A student at Howard University in 1964, Prez is invited to
do an interdisciplinary course with field work on Civil Rights in
Chicago, a city as divided as Gettysburg was a hundred years
earlier. Faced with police-state conditions, dubious armed gangs,
spies and provocateurs, Prez and the young women and men he works
with are propelled into a head-on fight with police. James Baldwin
wrote that the blues began "on the auction block," others say it
started with their kidnapping from Africa. Prez was born in exile,
with the blues. Only someone who has lived through that period can
write an enthralling and passionate story like Exile Blues. Gary
Freeman has done so with insight and sensitivity.
General
Imprint: |
Baraka Books
|
Country of origin: |
Canada |
Release date: |
November 2019 |
Authors: |
Douglas Gary Joseph Freeman
|
Dimensions: |
229 x 152mm (L x W) |
Format: |
Paperback
|
Pages: |
380 |
ISBN-13: |
978-1-77186-200-4 |
Categories: |
Books >
Fiction >
General
|
LSN: |
1-77186-200-9 |
Barcode: |
9781771862004 |
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