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Underground Railroad

by Colson Whitehead
Underground Railroad

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ISBN13: 9780385542364
ISBN10: 0385542364
Condition: Standard
DustJacket: Standard

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Awards

2016 National Book Award for Fiction
2017 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction
2017 Morning News Tournament of Books Winner
2017 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

From Powells.com

Black Lives Matter

The 2017 Morning News Tournament of Books

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Staff Pick

Colson Whitehead imagines a literal Underground Railroad in his latest novel of the same name. Stealthily shuttling blacks from the South to the North, the operators of the railroad are hyperaware of every possibility, but still, every moment discovery seems imminent. Cora, a slave on a cotton plantation, is helped with her escape, but even when she seems safe, fear is her constant companion. Her harrowing run from her owner is truly the stuff of literature. Don't miss Whitehead's National Book Award–winning scathing commentary on the Antebellum South.  Recommended By Dianah H., Powells.com

Whitehead manages to convey the whole horrible history of slavery — the African slavers, the transatlantic passage, the slave auctions, and the toxic environment of the Southern plantation — in the first three pages of this novel, using simple language and a notable absence of melodrama. It's an artistic coup that develops into a page-turner that imagines a real underground railroad system ferrying slaves to freedom, and the slave catchers who want to see it destroyed. The Underground Railroad is full of brutality that can be hard to stomach, but its complex characters and evocation of a time and experience alien to most readers is well worth it. Recommended By Rhianna W., Powells.com

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments

From prize-winning, bestselling author Colson Whitehead, a magnificent tour de force chronicling a young slave's adventures as she makes a desperate bid for freedom in the antebellum South

Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. Life is hell for all the slaves, but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood—where even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Matters do not go as planned—Cora kills a young white boy who tries to capture her. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted.

In Whitehead’s ingenious conception, the Underground Railroad is no mere metaphor—engineers and conductors operate a secret network of tracks and tunnels beneath the Southern soil. Cora and Caesar’s first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city’s placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.

Like the protagonist of Gulliver’s Travels, Cora encounters different worlds at each stage of her journey—hers is an odyssey through time as well as space. As Whitehead brilliantly re-creates the unique terrors for black people in the pre–Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once a kinetic adventure tale of one woman’s ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shattering, powerful meditation on the history we all share.

Review

"Far and away the most anticipated literary novel of the year, The Underground Railroad marks a new triumph for Whitehead…[A] book that resonates with deep emotional timbre. The Underground Railroad reanimates the slave narrative, disrupts our settled sense of the past and stretches the ligaments of history right into our own era...The canon of essential novels about America's peculiar institution just grew by one." Ron Charles, Washington Post

Review

"[M]asterful, urgent…A tragic, disturbing necessity: that describes the feeling of The Underground Railroad." USA Today

Review

"[A] potent, almost hallucinatory novel that leaves the reader with a devastating understanding of the terrible human costs of slavery. It possesses the chilling matter-of-fact power of the slave narratives collected by the Federal Writers’ Project in the 1930s, with echoes of Toni Morrison’s Beloved, Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, and brush strokes borrowed from Jorge Luis Borges, Franz Kafka and Jonathan Swift…He has told a story essential to our understanding of the American past and the American present." Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

Review

"Kept me up at night, had my heart in my throat, almost afraid to turn the next page. Get it, then get another copy for someone you know because you are definitely going to want to talk about it once you read that heart-stopping last page." Oprah Winfrey, (Oprah’s Book Club 2016 selection)

About the Author

Colson Whitehead is the New York Times bestselling author of The Noble Hustle, Zone One, Sag Harbor, The Intuitionist, John Henry Days, Apex Hides the Hurt, and one collection of essays, The Colossus of New York. A Pulitzer Prize finalist and a recipient of MacArthur and Guggenheim fellowships, he lives in New York City.

Colson Whitehead on PowellsBooks.Blog

I listen to a playlist of 2,000-plus songs when I work. A mix of punk, hip-hop, EDM, jazz, whatever. It keeps me company and provides opportunities to sing along and also: dance breaks. These are the new additions I made to the playlist in May of 2015, when I started writing The Underground Railroad...

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Average customer rating 4 (5 comments)

`
bookwormlizzie , October 03, 2017 (view all comments by bookwormlizzie)
Colson Whitehead does it again! Sometimes hyped novels let me down, but this one absolutely delivers. The setting is pre-Civil War America. And the Underground Railroad is an actual railroad. Cora is escaping her owner, Mr. Randall. The book wends its way through Cora's history as we discover her mother's escape, Cora's escape, and the places she flees to. There are enough twists and turns to keep the plot interesting. The writing is beautiful. And the entire setting reminds us of the gruesome reality of owning human beings. The author does not pull any punches - he deftly tells of the selling of slaves, the beating of slaves, and the casual violence perpetrated in the South. Highly recommend for everyone to read.

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Carolyn , February 20, 2017 (view all comments by Carolyn)
The Underground Railroad explores the question: what if the Underground Railroad had been in fact what its name suggests? Other than this surreal addition to the time period, the novel is primarily realistic in its presentation. The language is evocative and jarring by turn. At times, the work is as emotionally difficult to read due to its content as it is to put down. Some structural issues aside, this is one of the strongest works to be published for 2016. GIven our current political predicament, I highly recommend this work for anyone who asks, "How can horrible things be done by average citizens?"

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The Avid Reader , October 24, 2016 (view all comments by The Avid Reader)
The Underground Railroad is a very dark novel. The majority of the novel focuses on Cora (poor Caesar). I found the writing to be awkward and difficult to read (I just did not like the author's writing style). The book lacks flow. First we are with Cora, then it jumps to someone else, then back to Cora, and then to another character. It will also go back in time to tell you the backstory of the latest character (when Cora meets someone new on the Underground Railroad). It makes it hard to read and to get into the story. I was able to finish the book, but I did not like it or enjoy it (sorry). You need to be aware that The Underground Railroad contains very graphic violence. Some of the violence is very disturbing and upsetting. I give The Underground Railroad 2 out of 5 stars. I did like Colson Whitehead’s take on the Underground Railroad. He had tunnels running all over the United States and actual trains. I was curious, though, how people above ground did not hear the loud engines of the trains. Mr. Whitehead did capture the time and place quite accurately. The ending was extremely dissatisfying.

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writermala , September 10, 2016 (view all comments by writermala)
"The Underground Railroad" makes "Book of Negroes," and "The Help," read like the "Bobsey Twins." This story of Cora trying to escape from her veritable prison at a plantation in Georgia only to be repeatedly pursued by a slave catcher Ridgeway is a harrowing account of the treatment of African Americans from their capture in Africa to their treatment on plantations. For many the only hope of freedom is the Underground Railroad. Alas! It too does not run all the way.

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Tonstant Weader , August 11, 2016 (view all comments by Tonstant Weader)
As a fan of Colson Whitehead, I came to this book with high expectations. He had me worried for a bit. It begins on a cotton plantation in Georgia where Cora is an ostracized slave with grit and determination. The Randall plantation is cruel, life is harsh and I began to fear that Whitehead was going to disappoint me with something ordinary. However, as soon as we get to the Underground Railroad, well, then you know you’re in a real Colson Whitehead novel. Why? Because the Underground Railroad is a real train. It’s underground, it’s a railroad, and it takes people to freedom, or to the next stop anyway. The first leg takes them to South Carolina, where the first thing they see is a skyscraper. That’s more like it. I loved The Underground Railroad for many reasons, but most of all because the black people who were saved, saved themselves. Yes, there were white people who helped with the Underground Railroad, who hid runaways and played the role of station masters along the route, but the real agency was in the hands of black people. Who built the Underground Railroad? “Who builds anything in this country?” is the answer. This is a story of a black woman building her future, of black people building their freedom against overwhelming odds. This is The No-Help book, the one where black people make the decisions and rescue themselves. I am sure it will be terribly shocking for some. I received an Advance Review e-galley from the publisher via NetGalley.

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Product Details

ISBN:
9780385542364
Binding:
Hardcover
Publication date:
08/02/2016
Publisher:
Doubleday Books
Pages:
320
Height:
1.30IN
Width:
6.40IN
Author:
Colson Whitehead
Media Run Time:
B

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