Ancestors - (Black Dawn) by Adrienne Maree Brown (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Community ideals and magic clash in this follow-up to Grievers and Maroons by adrienne maree brown.

Ancestors is the powerful conclusion to adrienne maree brown's Grievers trilogy--a story of how life blooms amid tragedy and hate. In the wake of a mysterious pandemic known as Syndrome H-8, the survivors of a ravaged and isolated Detroit are building a future inside the network of deserted skyscrapers that define the city's skyline. Dune's magic keeps a lush green wall encircling the community, and while some settle inside its safety, others grow desperate to get out, fueling the tension between shelter and confinement. As Dune's power blossoms and her connection to the spirits of the departed deepens, she must learn how to balance the needs of her people, both living and dead.

Review Quotes

"Ancestors is a moving, kaleidoscopic portrait of resistance and survival ... adrienne maree brown has written something profound, a novel exploring those things we hold dear, what we preserve, and perhaps most importantly, what we must fight to defend." --Daniel Alarcón, author of At Night We Walk in Circles

"A timely narrative ... This post-industrial, post-pandemic, post-apocalyptic novel examines the collective struggle for harmony in the face of personal and collective trauma. ... Ancestors delivers tender conjecture full of somatic healing, spiritual fortitude, and human re-connection. This is the book we need." --Nandi Comer, Michigan Poet Laureate and author of Tapping Out

"In a place 'thick with souls, ' brown tells an un-mythological story of gentrification, a deadly virus, and the undoing of systems. ... Rich with beautiful Black-love-story-telling ... AMB's voice speaks in lush poems that give us optimism for a tangible revolutionary Detroit future. --jessica Care moore, Detroit Poet Laureate and author of We Want Our Bodies Back

Praise for Grievers

"Bestseller brown (Pleasure Activism) makes her fiction debut with the powerful, emotional story of Dune, a young woman living in Detroit, Mich., in the midst of a bizarre epidemic ... The first novel in AK Press's new Black Dawn series, which will focus on speculative fiction that expresses the values of antiracism, feminism, anticolonialism, and anticapitalism, this hits the nail on the head with its deep, moving exploration of loss, family, community, gentrification, and rapidly changing urban landscapes. It's a strong precedent that will leave readers eager for more." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"A beautiful debut novella by adrienne maree brown, who is already one of our most important voices in Afrofuturism and true-life worldbuilding. Grievers could not be more timely, tackling loss, plague, gentrification, memory and grief with a path toward hope in a future Detroit. Each paragraph is lovingly crafted, a story unto itself, blending into a tapestry no reader will soon forget." --Tananarive Due, American Book Award winner, author of Ghost Summer: Stories

"Grievers is about a plague in Detroit, and how a young woman makes sense of it. But more than that, it is a profound meditation on grief, ritual, endurance, and the power of imagination and creation. I'll be re-reading it for years to come." --Imani Perry, author of South to America

"In Grievers, adrienne gives us gentle mercy for our failing and grieving." --YES! Magazine

"This is a story of how our history shapes us, the hurt and the love and all the painful and joyful parts in between." --Buzzfeed Books

Praise for Maroons

"brown's sensational second contribution to AK Press's Black Dawn series, which highlights works of radical speculative fiction ... Grief, loneliness, connection, and a little bit of magic all work together to create a powerful metaphor for grassroots activism. Equally thrilling and thought-provoking, this will put readers in mind of speculative greats like Octavia Butler and Samuel R. Delany." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Maroons veers into magical territory, but still stays grounded in a narrative with a sense of hope. brown remains an innovative and important voice in fiction." --Electric Literature

About the Author

adrienne maree brown grows healing ideas in public through her multi-genre writing, her collaborations, and her podcasts. Informed by twenty-five years of movement facilitation, somatics, Octavia E. Butler scholarship, and her work as a doula, adrienne has nurtured emergent strategy, pleasure activism, radical imagination, and transformative justice as ideas and practices for change. Some of her books include Emergent Strategy, the New York Times-bestseller Pleasure Activism, We Will Not Cancel Us, Loving Corrections, and her two prior novellas in this series, Grievers and Maroons.