Last Cool Days

Fiction. Newly available from SPD. Set in colonial Trinidad, this powerful novel explores the barriers between black and white in a highly stratified and racially demarcated society. Marcus is a young black village boy who is fatefully attracted by the strangeness and the privileges of white children in his town and is befriended by the English overseer's son Anthony. The awkwardness and instability of this relationship in time reinforce his sense of insecurity and alienation, instilling in him an adult rage that leads ultimately to tragedy. John Stewart is a recipient of a Royal Society of Literature Award for LAST COOL DAYS. Currently, he is professor and director of African and African American Studies at the University of California, Davis.