
James
ABOUT
THE BOOK
When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father, recently returned to town. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and too-often-unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond. Jim’s agency, intelligence and compassion are shown in a radically new light.
NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS
The book is a re-envisioning of the novel Huckleberry Finn; The story is retold from the point of view of James, the slave, who accompanied Huck. The book is masterfully written and can stand on it’s own. (Miami-Dade Public Library) Percival Everett has done something truly remarkable with James, turning the nearly 150-year-old story of Huckleberry Finn into an even greater retelling from the perspective of the enslaved Jim. With his trademark wit, Everett displays the courage, ingenuity, and intelligence of enslaved folks while turning the classic adventure story into an odyssey of liberation. Though Jim and Huck experience many of the same events as in the original, the shift in narration allows both Huck and the reader to see the falsities of enslavement and white supremacy. (The Seattle Public Library)