Half-Blood Blues
Shortlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize
Winner of the 2011 Scotiabank Giller Prize
Winner of the 2012 Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize
Winner of the 2012 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award
Longlisted for the 2013 International Impac Dublin Literary Award
Shortlisted for the 2012 Orange Prize for Fiction
Shortlisted for the 2012 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction
Finalist for the 2011 Governor General's Award for Fiction
Finalist for the 2011 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize
A New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice pick
Amazon.ca Best Books of 2011: Top 100 Editors' Picks
A Quill & Quire Best Book of the Year 2011
A Globe and Mail Best Book of 2011
One of the Vancouver Sun's top ten books of 2011
A San Francisco Chronicle Recommended Book
Amazon.com Best Books of 2012
A Historical Novels Society Editor's Choice for February 2012
One of The Millions' Most Anticipated Books of 2012
An Amazon "Best of the Month" Pick for March 2012
Globe & Mail Book Club Inaugural Selection
The New York Times Book Review, Editor's Choice
Berlin, 1939. A young, brilliant trumpet-player, Hieronymus, is arrested in a Paris cafe. The star musician was never heard from again. He was twenty years old. He was a German citizen. And he was black.
Fifty years later, Sidney Griffiths, the only witness that day, still refuses to speak of what he saw. When Chip Jones, his friend and fellow band member, comes to visit, recounting the discovery of a strange letter, Sid begins a slow journey towards redemption.
From the smoky bars of pre-war Berlin to the salons of Paris, Sid leads the reader through a fascinating, little-known world, and into the heart of his own guilty conscience.
Half-Blood Blues is an electric, heart-breaking story about music, race, love and loyalty, and the sacrifices we ask of ourselves, and demand of others, in the name of art.
- Serpent's Tail, UK, June 2011
- Thomas Allen, Canada, September 2011
- Insel Verlag, Germany, November 2011
- Picador, US, March 2012
- Kastaniotis Editions, Greece
- Porto, Portugal
- Neri Pozza, Italy
- Skolska, Croatia
- Alba Editorial, Spain
- Shanghai Translation Publishing House, China
- Signatuur, Holland
- Liana Levi, France
- Leopard, Sweden