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. Dune’s mother, Kama, is the first victim of Syndrome H-8, which grabs hold of apparently healthy people and sends them into comas from which they never wake. Dune struggles to adapt to Kama’s abrupt absence from her life as Detroit’s citizens flee the city in a chaotic mass migration. Dune stays behind to investigate Syndrome H-8 using research materials on the history of Detroit left behind by her late father, peeling back layers of structural and institutional inequalities. 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. (Sept.)