When I put James McBride's new novel, Deacon King . He is the recipient of the 2013 National Book Award for fiction for his novel The Good Lord Bird . I was stuffing that down my gullet, Mr. McBride said on Friday, recalling the moment when his name was called. Deacon King Kong bursts with energy in the story of Sportcoat, a church deacon and a drunk, who shoots a drug dealer and accidentally sets off a chain of desperation and absurdity. } In addition, he recieved American Music Theater Festivals Stephen Sondheim Award in 1993, American Arts and Letters Richard Rodgers Award in 1996, and also the inaugural ASCAP Richard Rodgers Horizons Award in 1996. He develops a unique closeness with one of Browns sons, Fred, who is mentally challenged but keeps Henrys identity a secret when he learns that Henry is a boy. McBride has received various music awards as a composer such as the Richard Rodgers Foundation Horizon Award and the Stephen Sondheim Award. This felt like a missing piece in The Color of Water. James father was a black minister, married to Ruth, a woman in denial of her White heritage. The baseball team hes so proud of has disbanded and his star player, Deems Clemens, has gone from the neighborhoods No. The shooting and the humping not only mark Sportcoat for death, but they throw the Cause Houses into an uproar and set off an ill chain reaction among the various cliques that dominate the drug trade in South Brooklyn. Sportcoat is a character that Nora Zeale Hurston would have loved to have created. Piranesi lives in a never-ending colonnaded building with an Uffizi Gallerys worth of statuary lining the walls. I was just standing in the right place when the Lord coughed., Traveling With John Brown Along the Road to Literary Celebrity, https://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/25/books/james-mcbride-on-his-novel-the-good-lord-bird.html, I was so stunned that I walked up there with my napkin in my hand.. Upon graduation, he pursued a master's degree in journalism at Columbia University. }); He has written his novel The Good Lord Bird which recieved the 2013 National Book Award for fiction. And theres Sister Paul, a 102-year-old whom almost no one at Five Ends remembers but who faithfully mails her tithe of $4.13 from a nursing home in faraway Bensonhurst. You might not guess its that kind of book from its opening paragraph, irresistible as it is: Deacon Cuffy Lambkins of Five Ends Baptist Church became a walking dead man on a cloudy September afternoon in 1969. This is 1969 in the Republic of Brooklyn, where aunties chain-smoked and died at age 102, a kid named Spike Lee saw God, the ghosts of the departed Dodgers soaked up all possibility of new hope, and penniless desperation ruled the lives of the suckers too black or too poor to leave. In McBrides hands its a place alive with humanity. Mr. McBride, who was raised in a churchgoing household, was fascinated by the firmness of Browns religious beliefs. And the greatest sin a person can do is to take away that life. He is brilliant with words. $j("#facebookRegPrompt").hide(); We recommend you to check the complete list of Famous writer. I deserved em all. Read her today! He was born on September 11, 1957, in New York City, the United States. His most recent novel, Deacon King Kong, has officially been selected as .css-9cezh6{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-decoration-thickness:0.0625rem;text-decoration-color:inherit;text-underline-offset:0.25rem;color:#E61957;-webkit-transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;transition:all 0.3s ease-in-out;}.css-9cezh6:hover{color:#595959;text-decoration-color:border-link-body-hover;}Oprah's Book Club pick. Some novels are simply beautiful. 21, 2020. In 2013, The Good Lord Bird, his comic novel about abolitionist John Brown, won the National Book Award. Sportcoat is also grieving the recent death of his wife . Sportcoat shoots the ear of 19 year old drug dealer, Deems Clemens, with an ancient gun, although he has no memory of doing this afterwards. Sometimes that works, sometimes that doesnt. Born on September 11, 1957 in United States, James McBride (writer) started his career as writer . The two later parted ways. In Weather, a librarian named Lizzie is weighed down by the torrent of information she keeps encountering about our doomed planet. Hettie, with her red wig and sharp tongue, is a lively presence, despite being two years dead, having drowned in the harbor under mysterious circumstances, in full view of the Statue of Liberty. if (hash === 'blog' && showBlogFormLink) { The idea for The Good Lord Bird first developed around 2009, when Mr. McBride was conducting research at a historical society in Maryland. follow me on Instagram at @elle_mentbooks. Its a traditional story, and it works on every level. Meet the authors making sense of a wild 2020, Look up: The 32 most spectacular ceilings in Los Angeles, Is your loved one on a business trip? The title character is a young boy in 1980s Glasgow shuttled from one public housing unit to another, starkly alienated from his already fractured family by his suppressed gay identity. Leave the World BehindBy Rumaan AlamEcco: 256 pages, $28. He later attained his journalism degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1980. McBride published the first volume The Process, a CD-based documentary in 2005. A death-defying drunkard. I think it was the writing style itself that I didn't connect to. Ruths tenacity and discipline ensured that all her children attended college and some of them graduated from universities. 1857, Kansas Territory. Sportcoat is also grieving the recent death of his wife, Hettie. Gabino Iglesias is an author, book reviewer and professor living in Austin, Texas. [CDATA[ James McBride is a native New Yorker and a graduate of New York City public schools. How did you and your siblings go from being beaten as a child to such a loving an appreciative relationship with your mother? He cant remember shooting or humping Deems, refuses to believe he would do anything that nuts. $$('.authorBlogPost .body img').each(function(img) { Text messages were flooding his cellphone. The novel starts with a shocking incident: Sportcoat Cuffy, a church deacon with a drinking problem, shoots Deems, a 19-year-old drug dealer and former baseball star. Before taking up a full-time novel-writing career, James McBride wrote for The Boston Globe, and The Washington Post, among other notable Magazines in the US. Even though there is a shooting that the story revolves around and a few murders, it's feels more heartwarming? When McBride, a National Book Award winner for his novel The Good Lord Bird, decided to write an entire book about James Brown, he wanted to push beyond the hype and racism he says haunts Brown's . Memorial DriveBy Natasha TretheweyEcco: 224 pages, $28. 71 year old old timer, Five Ends Baptist Church Deacon Cuffy Lambkin, aka Sportcoat, is drunk on his buddy Rufus Harley's special blend of hooch named King Kong. I found myself constantly bouncing between 2 stars, one minute, and 4 stars the next. Serge rides again in Tim Dorseys The Maltese Iguana, Michael Connelly to cut ribbon for new South Tampa Barnes & Noble, Black history lives in the present in Cheryl Heads Times Undoing, Book Talk: Dominique Richardson, Sorboni Banerjee speak at Oxford Exchange, Tampa Bay theater company will set up library of banned books in protest, Book Talk: Veronica Roth to discuss Arch-Conspirator at Oxford Exchange, Book Talk: Novelist Keven Renken will read from his work in Tampa, Amazon announces drop date for Season 6 of Michael Connellys Bosch. The Good Lord Bird, a 417-page novel that manages to be rooted in the true story of slavery and darkly funny, was hardly an unnoticed book this year. McBride's characters are something to behold. Lastly there is Sportcoat himself, a man who's a living myth, an impossible amalgamation of stories that make him seem otherworldly, maybe even immortal. There, she met, and She married an African American religious man, and together they established a church from fellowship sessions conducted in their living room. James was born and raised in New York City with his eleven siblings, spending his early years in Red Hook, Brooklyn and Queens. McBride is a father of three children Jordan, Azure, and Nash McBride. The one Haitian character brings a virus back from the island and has a thing for voodoo dolls. And yet the brightest, most invigorating work came from outside the aristocracy. In 1997, Riverhead published McBride's bestselling memoir The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother. The book is read in high schools and universities across America and is translated to over 16 languages with 2.5 million books sold. In August, it was prominently displayed on the cover of The New York Times Book Review, where Baz Dreisinger praised Mr. McBride for writing masterfully, like a modern-day Mark Twain: evoking sheer glee with every page. In The Washington Post, Marie Arana called it a boisterous, highly entertaining, altogether original novel.. This took a lot longer for me to finish than I was anticipating. McBride has written musical lyrics for notable artists like Anita Baker, Gary Burton, and other famous musicians. McBride later published Miracle at St. Anna in 2002. I was just trying to get through it, Mr. McBride, one of five finalists for the award, said later. The lesson here? 1 plug, a dreadful, poison-selling, murderous meathead with all the appeal of a Cyclops. Sportcoats relationship with his wife of 40 years, Hettie, has also cratered. An exuberant comic opera set to the music of life. Deacon King Kong. Authors from across the spectrum of notoriety and experience turned up with writing that cut particularly deep in this most horribilis of all the anni. In September 1969, a fumbling, cranky old church deacon known as Sportcoat shuffles into the courtyard of the Cause Houses housing project in south Brooklyn, pulls a .38 . GiveDirectly, Your Email (optional - only if you want a reply ). All of thats true, but almost none of it is quite as it seems. James McBride (writer), better known by her family name James McBride, is a popular American writer. Bold, Brilliant and Captivating! Edie, a struggling painter and publishing grunt who has slept her way through the office, meets Eric, who is twice her age and in an open marriage. The writer who came to mind most clearly during the reading was Jimmy Breslin, who shares his insider's love of New York, his journalistic background, his talent for dialogue and beautifully wrought farce. Deacon King Kong by James McBride is a 2020 Random House publication. Fast, Complex And Funny, 'Deacon King Kong' Is A Love Letter To New York City. James McBride's Deacon King Kong is a feverish love letter to New York City, people, and writing. The Color of Wateris McBride's attempt to understand his mother, Ruth, by uncovering the past she never wanted to discuss. Ruth candidly describes her parents bland marriage; her delicate, disabled mother; and her brutal, sexual bigot of a father; and how she abandoned the rest of the family and ran away from home. He lives between his two homes in New York and Pennsylvania with his wife and three children. McBride, whose 2020 novel " Deacon King Kong " was named one of the. by By JOHN F. MORRISON, morrisj@phillynews.com Published Jan 10, 2010 Five-CaratSoul, an acclaimed short story collection, is teeming with such memorable figures. I knew what the melody of the song was going to be, he said. James McBride helps lead a team of writers and editors in producing CFR's coverage of global affairs, and also writes on economics, energy policy, and European politics. I would have enjoyed it more if he had done this less, but found it overall entertaining. Deems dodges at the last second and the bullet merely rips his ear off, but the consequences of Sportcoat's actions go above and beyond a damaged ear and a trip to the hospital. Chances are, after finishing Deacon King Kong, you'll have one word on your mind: More. McBride's father died in 1957, at the age of 45, before James was born, leaving Ruth McBride, a white woman of Jewish descent, to raise her children alone. He has worked as a writer and musician since 1995 and through his success, he has managed to attain decent possessions. During his twenties, McBride was a staff writer with the Boston Globe, People magazine, and The Washington Post. Leilani knows how to talk about wanting in ways that make you sweat. Nominee for Best Historical Fiction (2020). Raised in an Orthodox Jewish family in the South, Ruth went on to marry two Black men in New York, and raise a total of 12 childrenall of whom went on to be successful. His father died on April 5, 1957, at the age of 45 from cancer. He first wrote his memoir, The Color of Water in 1995, a book that describes his life growing up in a large, poor American-African family led by his white Jewish mother. MemorialBy Bryan WashingtonRiverhead: 320 pages, $27. This isnt an apocalypse novel (2020 is too complicated for that); its a high-RPM meditation on how it feels to experience collapse. There is an abundance of comic relief through the book as Henry and Brown separate for a time before reuniting once more during Browns religious quests. Award-winning author James McBride has built a career exploring American culture and identity through his storytelling, starting back in 1996, with his memoir "The Color of Water" about his . Our editors handpick the products that we feature. Heavy hitters returned after almost a generation away from publishing. The novel is 370 pages, but McBride has packed enough in there for a dozen novellas, and reading them all mashed together is a pleasure. He lives in Pennsylvania and New York. Well deliver ideas every Thursday for going out, staying home or spending time outdoors. Song Yet Sunguses fantastical devices to tell the story of American history, one that is intrinsically wrapped up with thehorrors of slavery. Stuart writes so candidly, youll practically hear Shuggies mothers beer cans clanking in her handbag, shiver from the chill of a childhood underheated in every way. Piranesi is vibrant, original, a true book lovers novel. Christopher Darden Lawyer, Bio, Wiki, Age, Height, Wife, Attorney, and Net Worth, Samantha Irby Blog, Bio, Wiki, Age, Height, Family, Husband, Books, And Net Worth, Copyright 2023 | WordPress Theme by MH Themes, List of States in the US, Alphabetical list of States in the U.S., and Abbreviation of States in United States. Copyright 1999 - 2023 GradeSaver LLC. His mother Best summary PDF, themes, and quotes. Get help and learn more about the design. His story focuses on the people that make the Big Apple what it is: the strange, the poor, the insane, the mobsters. He graduated with his bachelors degree in 1979. Caught amid forces far beyond their control,and fighting for a country in which they are not free, the soldiers find themselves on a collision path with one of the war's most tragic massacres. Once again, McBride has created a whole swath of colorful characters. NEXT to that, all rules and religions in the worldare secondary, mere words and beliefs that people CHOOSE to believe and KILL and HATE by.. If youre a fan of the psychological thriller genre, you need to read Freida McFadden! The poverty and racism are there, but so too are McBrides huge heart, LOL humor and amazing writing. he grew up in Brooklyns Red Hook housing projects until he was seven years old and is the eighth child out of 12 of his fathers children. Ruth lost two husbands; she struggled with harsh ridicule, overwhelming misfortune, and racism in an all-black community. Thats the day the old deacon, known as Sportcoat to his friends, marched out to the plaza of the Causeway Housing Projects in South Brooklyn, stuck an ancient .38 Colt in the face of a nineteen-year-old drug dealer named Deems Clemens, and pulled the trigger.. And that's where James McBride puts his focus. Now she was all New York: insolent, mouthy, and fresh, appearing out of nowhere at the oddest times of the day, and each time wearing a new damn wig on her head, which, he suspected, was something shed received as a gift from the Lord for her life struggles. But on the matter of why Sportcoat shot Deems, Hettie has no answers. He explained it with great detail and description that it would make the audience know that what he is saying was accurate. Sportcoat alone can see Hettie, and her ghost laces into him mercilessly. James McBride Wife He is currently single. His critically acclaimed memoir, The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother, explores the author's struggle to understand his biracial identity and the experience of his white, Jewish mother, who moved to Harlem, married a black man, and raised 12 children. Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. For all the laughs, he never loses sight of the terrible longitudinal harm that African diasporic and Latine peoples have suffered in the New World. This is a narrative about flawed, poor people navigating an ugly, racist world and trying their best with the help of God, each other, or the bottle; their stories are unique, but the struggles are universal and that makes this a novel about all of us. He studied music in Ohios Oberlin Conservatory music school and went on to graduate further with an MA in Journalism from Columbia University, New York. Featuring novels, memoirs, and a James Brown biography. James McBride an award-winning author, musician and screenwriter has won the 2022 Thurber Prize for American Humor. Like your colmados got jokes. Perhaps no other medium has better helped us process 2020. A cast of nicknamed characters in 1960s Brooklyn swirl through this novel - it's the minor Italian crime lords and the retiring Black church members making up the majority. When I heard of the premise for this book, I wasn't very excited, even when reviews were ecstatic. Welcome back. James McBride was so sure that his novel "The Good Lord Bird . .css-ssumvd{display:block;font-family:Gilroy,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif;font-size:1.0625rem;font-weight:bold;line-height:1.25;margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}@media (any-hover: hover){.css-ssumvd:hover{color:link-hover;}}@media(min-width: 40.625rem){.css-ssumvd{letter-spacing:0rem;margin-top:0.9375rem;}}Gayle King Interviews Angela Bassett, Dwyane Wades Daughter Granted Legal Name Change, Gayle Says March Is a Good Month for TV Lovers, The "Friends" Women Reunite to Celebrate Courteney, The Reason Hoda Kotb Hasn't Been on the Today Show, Keke Palmer Is a New Mom! It's that good. Theres Thomas Elefante, a.k.a. The two later parted ways. But just because McBride is playing doesnt mean hes fooling around. He lives in Pennsylvania and New York. Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account. Just not at bedtime you wont be able to put her thrillers down! This James McBride can write! James McBride is a native New Yorker and a graduate of New York City public schools. Henry hopes to run away from Browns custody. Your purchase helps support NPR programming. I love my grandmother to pieces but it felt like one of my weekly two hour phone calls with her. His memoir, The Color of Water, is an ode to his mother, who was raised in an Orthodox Jewish family in the South and went on to have 12 children with two Black men in the New York. And if that werent incident enough, McBrides got more: Elefante, the Italian smuggler whose men fished Hetties body out of the harbor, is approached by his fathers former cellmate, who claims that said pops hid away a World War II treasure worth millions. Theres something to be said for quiet writing, sentences that breaststroke forward, making only the softest waves. These are just a sampling of the many richly drawn characters whose lives intertwine in this soaring novel, which blendshumor and the wisdom on each page. Andrew D. McBride and Ruchel Dwajra Zylska. Then cell service disappears and a series of otherworldly events punctuate the story massive herds of roaming deer, unexplained ailments, a piercing sound in the sky. Her memoir, Memorial Drive, lets her mother speak. This makes the top 10 for my entire reading life. The plot is exhilarating, but so is the prose: Each sentence is a side-splitting delight. Broadway went dark. Writers & LoversBy Lily KingGrove: 320 pages, $27. Lord save us all from the book hype machine. I loved this book: funny, violent, witty, adventurous, movingIt takes us into the Cause project in the late 60s with a background of social revolution, drugs, gangs, cultural mixing, and baseball in a wonderfully lifelike canvas. Thats how it feels, approximately every 15 pages, as you pick your way through the artful wreckage Alam has sculpted in Leave the World Behind. A family on a Hamptons vacation is surprised when their Airbnbs owners show up, relaying news of a blackout across the East Coast. The mother complied, calling him "Sportcoat," a term she'd overheard while pulling cotton at of the farm of J.C. Yancy of Barnwell County, where she worked shares Deacon King Kong is full of heart, humor, and compassion. In addition to composing music, McBride plays the tenor sax. I'm not a very good person with small talk and chit chat and that was basically what the majority of the book was centered around. He is a man of average stature. Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey always wrote of public pain and private struggle. In answering why Sportcoat felt compelled to uproot the Cause Houses' social milieu, McBride weaves a complicated plot that involves art heists and injustices, repentant mobsters and gossiping church ladies. What can be forgotten or ignored is what an icon he was for black self-realization and pride. Deacons, church ladies, corner boys, mobsters, moonshine, moonflowers, "white people" cheese, folklore, ghosts, gossip, looting, shooting, and goofing. Want more of our free, weekly newslettersinyourinbox? Sportcoat has a 26 year old blind son, Pudgy Fingers, and lost his beloved wife, Hettie, when she walked into the river 2 years ago, since then he continues to see and converse with her, desperate for her to tell him where she kept the Church Christmas Collection, money that the poverty stricken people need back. McBride is currently a Distinguished Writer-in-Residence at New York University, and lives in South Nyack, New York, with his wife and two daughters. This story of the author's struggle to come to terms with his biracial identity, his Jewish' mother's history, and the general context of race relations in America has been translated into sixteen languages worldwide. Deacon King Kongfinds the sublime in the ordinary. Legends in the making pushed themselves into uncharted territory. My adult life has been complete with you as a part of it. His most recent novel, Deacon King Kong, has officially been selected as Oprah's Book Club pick.Set in Brooklyn's Cause Houses housing project in the year 1969, Deacon King Kong is a polyphonic epic, bursting with vibrant and unforgettable characters. All for very good reason. In September 1969, a fumbling, cranky old church deacon known as Sportcoat shuffles into the courtyard of the Cause Houses housing project in south Brooklyn, pulls a .38 from his pocket, and in front of everybody shoots the project's drug dealer at point-blank range. Rumaan Alams Leave the World Behind starts as satire and becomes the anatomy of normal life during global disaster and a dire warning to us all. }); The usage of Ethos was very evident as James McBride developed his credibility through explaining his mother's life story from her childhood to adulthood. Not affiliated with Harvard College. He studied composition at The Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio and received his Masters in Journalism from Columbia University in New York at age 22. The National Book Award winner sets his new comic novel in a Brooklyn housing project in 1969. God is the color of water. Even Sportcoat doesnt know the answer to that question. Ronald McDonald House Further, the book contains 301 pages available at the Kindle store at $12.99. In addition, he has authored seven best-selling books. James McBride is the author of "Deacon King Kong." . He can write a sentence that is funny, sarcastic, tragic, and enlightening, all in one, albeit, long sentence. He was born to his hardworking father and mother in New York City, the United States. Often the characters are revealed in poetic street raps about how they earned their nicknames and what's going on. James McBride Biography. Educate yourself or you'll be a nobody!, It was always so hot, and everyone was so polite, and everything was all surface but underneath it was like a bomb waiting to go off. . The National Book Award-winning author's deeply felt new novel is an American crime story, just not the kind on TV. McBride will be cracking wise and without missing a beat hell hurl a thunderbolt whose clarifying rage could light up half a borough: the Republic of Brooklyn, where cats hollered like people, dogs ate their own feces, aunties chain-smoked and died at age 102, a kid named Spike Lee saw God, the ghosts of the departed Dodgers soaked up all possibility of new hope and penniless desperation ruled the lives of the suckers too black or too poor to leave, while in Manhattan the buses ran on time, the lights never went out, the death of a single white child in a traffic accident was a Page 1 story, while phony versions of black and Latino life ruled the Broadway roost, making white writers rich West Side Story, Porgy & Bess, Purlie Victorious and on it went, the whole business of the white mans reality lumping together like a giant, lopsided snowball, the Great American Myth, the Big Apple, the Big Kahuna, the City That Never Sleeps, while the blacks and Latinos who cleaned the apartments and dragged out the trash and made the music and filled the jails with sorrow slept the sleep of the invisible and functioned as local color.. Add to that the fact that, at 71, hes been pickling his brain in alcohol for decades the nickname that gives the book its title comes from his fondness for a particularly potent home brew called King Kong its no surprise he has trouble remembering things. Land; Ecco Press; Chia Messina; Riverhead Books), Bryan Washington, author of the novel Memorial., Lynn Steger Strong, the author of Want., Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, 10 great books that got lost in the noise of 2020, Review: Apocalypse now: A funny, terrifying end-of-the-world novel is as 2020 as it gets, Top ten lists for 2020: The years best movies, TV, music and more, 35 years after her mothers murder, a poet of Black struggle writes a monument, This fall, we need books more than ever. Music teaches you to fail. If you're seeking more books by McBride, start here. And Sportcoat? McBride is the son of Rev. Photo from Goodreads. He holds several honorary doctorates and is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University. For example, there's a brilliant chapter about the way red killer ants made their way to New York City and became part of the Cause Houses projects: a sole phenomenon in the Republic of Brooklyn, where cats hollered like people, dogs eat their own feces, aunties chain-smoked and died at age 102, a kid named Spike Lee saw God, the ghosts of the departed Dodgers soaked up all possibility of new hope, and penniless desperation ruled the lives of the suckers too black or too poor to leave, while in Manhattan the buses ran on time, the lights never went out, the death of a single white child in a traffic accident was a page one story, while phony versions of black and Latino life ruled the Broadway roost, making white writers rich West Side Story, Porgy & Bess, Purlie Victorious and on it went, the whole business of the white man's reality lumping together like a giant, lopsided snowball, the Great American Myth, the Big Apple, the Big Kahuna, the City That Never Sleeps, while the blacks and Latinos who cleaned the apartments and dragged out the trash and made the music and filled the jails with sorrows slept the sleep of the invisible and functioned as local color. In addition, he has authored seven best-selling books. McBride is the tenor saxophonist for the Rock Bottom Remainders. 'Good Lord Bird' Gives Abolitionist Heroes Novel Treatment, James McBride Says Fiction Writing Allows Him More Freedom. The prose is relentless and McBride's storytelling skills shine as he drags readers at breakneck speed trough a plethora of lives, times, events, and conversations. McBride is a father of three children Jordan, Azure, and Nash McBride. Do read this one. But has he always lived there? Its clear that hes having a blast, and his spirit of funning irreverence supercharges the entire narrative like home-brewed black lightning. McBrides net worth is $4 Million. The humor actually hit as funny to me (for once, a rarity.) Over scrambled eggs, toast and coffee on Friday morning at a diner near New York University, where he has been a distinguished writer in residence for the last seven years, Mr. McBride was still shaking his head at his prize. More books than SparkNotes. At age 65, Ruth earned a Social work degree from Temple University. This book was a balm for my soul, a portrait of a black church community circa 1969 with sweet characters (well, most of them), interconnections that stretch back decades, and a plot with more than one mystery at its heart. James McBride Education He is married with three children. Fred feels terrible about Henrys pretense, but he takes it as a natural means of self-defense and protection of the racist pro-slavery army. His despise for his wife Hudis due to her condition set an example for the kids and . Later this year, the TV adaptation of his novel, The Good Lord Bird, will air on Showtime, with Ethan Hawke in the lead role. McBride undercooks a couple of his subplots, especially the druggy ones. I admit it: Though this novel was published in February, I only noticed it early this fall when it showed up on shortlists for the Booker Prize and the National Book Award and suddenly its debut author was everywhere.