"Petry is the writer we have been waiting for; hers are the stories we
need to fully illuminate the questions of our moment, while also
offering a page-turning good time. Ann Petry, the woman, had it all, and
so does her insightful, prescient and unputdownable prose." -- Tayari
Jones, New York Times Book Review
From author of the bestselling novel The Street, a "masterpiece of
social realism" (Wall Street Journal) about a tragic love affair,
and a powerful look into how class, race, and love intersected in
midcentury America.
With a new introduction by Kaitlyn Greenidge, author of Libertie.
"The Narrows deftly explores what it means to have an interior life
under the unrelenting gaze of whiteness...it is a master class in using
descriptions of place and space to explore the realities of race,
gender, class and psychology."--Kaitlyn Greenidge, from her
introduction
It's Saturday, past midnight, and thick fog rolls in from the river like
smoke. Link Williams is standing on the dock when he hears quick
footsteps approaching, and the gasp of a woman too terrified to scream.
After chasing off her pursuer, he takes the woman to a nearby bar to
calm her nerves, and as they enter, it's as if the oxygen has left the
room: they, and the other patrons, see in the dim light that he's Black
and she's white.
Link is a brilliant Dartmouth graduate, former athlete and soldier who,
because of the lack of opportunities available to him, tends bar; Camilo
is a wealthy married woman dissatisfied with and bored of her life of
privilege. Thrown together by a chance encounter, both Link and Camilo
secretly cross the town's racial divide, defying the social prejudices
of their times.
In this stunning and heartbreaking story, Petry illuminates the harsh
realities of race and class through two doomed lovers. This profound,
necessary novel stakes Petry's place as an indelible writer of American
literature.
"I've recently had my brain re-wired by Ann Petry, and it's that
exhilarating feeling of falling in love with one of your lifetime
writers for the first time." --Brandon Tyler
