friday black by nana kwame adjei brenyah

“Zimmer Land” – an allusion to the gated community where George Zimmerman, the killer of Trayvon Martin, lived – satirises the vaunted claims that immersive virtual reality experiences lead to greater empathy. They are rooted in soil where reality is already dialled up to 11: this is America, after all. What if, in the stampede of Black Friday - as bargain hunters stab their competitors with stiletto heels - it was accepted that shopper deaths were inevitable? Or what if foetuses could plead for their lives, as in “Lark Street”, in which a pair of twin aborted foetuses snuggle up on the pillow of their dozing father and compete for his affection? Throughout, these uncanny tales – recognisable but unsettling, like nightmares or secrets you dare not share – draw on real events, such as the mass murder of children. This is just one of a frightening collection of speculative scenarios, where everyday storylines are pushed, as in episodes of Black Mirror, to darkly funny extremes. Friday Black is his first book.The book’s title refers to the febrile state of mind that overcomes customers who endure Black Friday “to haul their newly purchased happiness home”. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in numerous publications, including Guernica, Compose: A Journal of Simply Good Writing, Printer’s Row, Gravel, and The Breakwater Review, where he was selected by ZZ Packer as the winner of the 2nd Annual Breakwater Review Fiction Contest. O'Connor fellow in fiction at Colgate University. He graduated from SUNY Albany and went on to receive his MFA from Syracuse University. Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is from Spring Valley, New York.

Friday black by nana kwame adjei brenyah