James

An instant Sunday Times bestseller
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2024
Shortlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction 2024
Shortlisted for Waterstones Book of the Year 2024
Selected as a 'Book of the Year' in The Telegraph, New Statesman, TLS and The Spectator

'Truly extraordinary books are rare, and this is one of them' – Roddy Doyle, Booker Prize-winning author of Paddy Clarke, Ha Ha Ha

James is a profound and ferociously funny reimagining of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, told from the perspective of the enslaved Jim. From Percival Everett, award-winning author of The Trees and Erasure, adapted into the Oscar-winning film American Fiction.

The Mississippi River, 1861. When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a new owner in New Orleans and separated from his wife and daughter forever, he flees to nearby Jackson’s Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father who recently returned to town.

So begins a dangerous and transcendent journey along the Mississippi River, towards the elusive promise of the free states and beyond. As James and Huck navigate the treacherous waters, each bend in the river holds the promise of both salvation and demise. And together, the unlikely pair embark on the most life-changing odyssey of them all . . .

‘Who should read this book? Every single person in the country’ – Ann Patchett, bestselling author of Tom Lake

'James has the potential to become a classic . . . Thrilling, bold and profound' – The Sunday Times

'Funny, wise, gracious; this may be Everett's best book yet' – Bonnie Garmus, bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry

'Magnificent . . . This is Everett's most thrilling novel, but also his most soulful' – The New York Times

'Unforgiving and compassionate, beautiful and brutal, a tragedy and a farce' – Hernan Diaz, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Trust

Genre: Historical

"Percival Everett is a giant of American letters, and James is a canon-shatteringly great book. Unforgiving and compassionate, beautiful and brutal, a tragedy and a farce, this brilliant novel rewrites literary history to let us hear the voices it has long suppressed." - Hernán Diaz

"This is a brilliant, accessible, and very necessary companion to Huckleberry Finn." - Dave Eggers

"Pure brilliance. Funny, wise, gracious; this may be Everett's best book yet." - Bonnie Garmus

"Percival Everett is a genre." - Kiese Laymon

"Percival Everett is an audacious, beguiling American master, whose wild trajectory has reached astonishing highs in the past decade. Now comes James, which enlists and devours not only Mark Twain's novel but aspects of Melville, Ellison, and even Kafka to makes an irrevocable intervention into the canon. Everett is simply playing this game at a higher level, and it is the most serious game imaginable." - Jonathan Lethem

"James is funny and horrifying, brilliant and riveting. In telling the story of Jim instead of Huckleberry Finn, Percival Everett delivers a powerful, necessary corrective to both literature and history. I found myself cheering both the writer and his hero. Who should read this book? Every single person in the country." - Ann Patchett

"James is a masterpiece. I read it late this summer, and I have already recommended it to enough people to put it on the bestseller lists, in the classrooms, libraries, book clubs and hands in which it so rightly belongs." - Francine Prose