A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR • FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION • A
READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Two top women gladiators fight for their
freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far-removed from America’s own in this
explosive hotly-anticipated debut novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Friday
Black • LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCEThis book is so good. Brutal
subject matter beautiful writing. This one is from the heart.” —Stephen KingA Best Book of the
Year: The New York Times The Washington Post NPR Elle Esquire Chicago Tribune Lit Hub
Kirkus ReviewsLike Orwell’s 1984 and Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale Adjei-Brenyah’s book
presents a dystopian vision so…illuminating that it should permanently shift our understanding
of who we are and what we’re capable of doing.” —The Washington PostShe felt their eyes all
those executioners…Loretta Thurwar and Hamara Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of the
Chain-Gang All-Stars the cornerstone of CAPE or Criminal Action Penal Entertainment a highly
popular highly controversial profit-raising program in America’s increasingly dominant private
prison industry. It’s the return of the gladiators and prisoners are competing for the
ultimate prize: their freedom. In CAPE prisoners travel as Links in Chain-Gangs competing in
death matches before packed arenas with righteous protestors at the gates. Thurwar and Staxxx
both teammates and lovers are the fan favorites. And if all goes well Thurwar will be free in
just a few matches a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer. As she prepares to
leave her fellow Links Thurwar considers how she might help preserve their humanity in
defiance of these so-called games. But CAPE’s corporate owners will stop at nothing to protect
their status quo and the obstacles they lay in Thurwar’s path have devastating consequences.
Moving from the Links in the field to the protestors to the CAPE employees and beyond
Chain-Gang All-Stars is a kaleidoscopic excoriating look at the American prison system’s
unholy alliance of systemic racism unchecked capitalism and mass incarceration and a
clear-eyed reckoning with what freedom in this country really means from a new and necessary
American voice” (Tommy Orange The New York Times Book Review).
