The story of three contentious generations unfolds in a small town in Nova Scotia settled by the formerly enslaved, moving from the Great Depression to Sixties social protest to the economic floundering of the 1980s as Kath Ella, her life shaped by hardship and the continuing prejudice against those with dark skin, sees beloved son Omar/Etienne turn his back on their Canadian town, with grandson Warner drifting further away. But they, too, remained shaped by Africaville in a story that investigates issues of race, identity, and home. Lots of in-house excitement for this debut novel by a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Harvard University, and Columbia University's MFA program; with a 25,000-copy first printing.

DEBUT Moving magisterially between a windy bluff in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where African Americans settled well over a century ago, and the American South from which their forbears came and to which some of their children returned, Colvin's absorbing and fluidly written debut novel captures an acute sense of ties loosened and rebound. In the early 1900s, Kath Ella, momentarily misled by a friend she looses to tragedy, manages a scholarship to college in Montreal, where she eventually settles with a white husband after having a child with Omar, a boy from her hometown sent to Canada from Mississippi by his imprisoned protester parents for his safety. Son Etienne, adopted by her husband, can pass for white and eventually settles in Alabama, turning away from his African Canadian roots, much as he loved his mother. But his son, Warner, works his way back. The town itself, fractured by various names and incomers, regroups as Africaville mid-20th-century, with Kath's sister Louella among those strongest in maintaining family and tradition. Throughout, the longing to define oneself for oneself vies with the powerful rootedness defined by Africaville, and the pain caused by shuffled-off family bonds is palpable. VERDICT Excellent reading that revives our sense of community while revealing North America's racial complexity in a new light. [See Prepub Alert, 5/20/19.]—Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal

Inspired by Africville, a neighborhood in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Colvin's intriguing and memorable debut shines a light on a little-known black experience: the freed slaves from the Caribbean and U.S. who established a community in Canada in the 1800s. This family saga extends from 1918 to 1992 and focuses on descendants of the Sebolt and Platt families, who are joined when Omar Platt has an affair with Kath Ella Sebolt in 1936 right before his accidental death. She gives birth to a son and leaves Halifax for Montreal to further her education, meeting her future husband there, a white man who adopts baby Omar, renaming him Etienne. Etienne moves to Alabama in the 1960s, passes for white, marries a white woman, and ignores the black side of his family to such an extent that his own son, Warner, doesn't find out about his black heritage until after his father's death. Colvin expertly weaves in the subject of owning one's heritage as Warner comes to terms with his Canadian past and the tragedies that dogged the Sebolts and Platts. The book covers much territory—the black experience in a small enclave in Canada and Etienne's and Warner's grappling with their racial identity—and sometimes these varying plots feel like they belong in two different books, making for a novel that feels diffuse. Nevertheless, this is a penetrating, fresh look at the indomitable spirit of black pioneers and their descendants. (Dec.)