A debut novel everyone will be talking about, Avery Cunningham\'s epic love story is a triumph and a tale of intrigue, racial tension, and class warfare, set against the glamorous and gritty backdrop of early 20th century Chicago.
Debut author Avery Cunningham\'s stunning novel is at once an epic love story, a riveting historical drama, and a brilliant exploration of Black society and perseverance when the \'20s first began to roar..
Trapped between the monolith of Jim Crow, the inflexible world of the Black upper class, and the violence of Prohibition-era Chicago, Jay and Nelly work together and stoke the flames of a love worth fighting for.
But Jay also introduces a whole new world to Nelly, one where her horizons can extend beyond the confines of her ivory tower.
When Nelly\'s and Jay\'s paths cross, she recruits him to help expose the Mayor and bring about lasting change in a corrupt city.
He washed up on Chicago\'s storied shores and forged his own way to the top of the city\'s underworld, running Chicago\'s swankiest speakeasy, where the rich and famous rub elbows with gangsters and politicians alike.
When a tragic turn of fate gave Jay a rare path out, he took it without question.
Born in rural Alabama to a murdered biracial couple, Jay Shorey knows firsthand what it means to be denied a chance at the American dream.
Her latest assignment thrusts her into the den of a dangerous vice lord: the so-called Mayor of Maxwell Street.
For the past year, she has worked undercover as an investigative journalist, sharing the achievements and tribulations of everyday Black people living in the shadow of Jim Crow.
But Nelly has aspirations beyond society influence and marriage.
After the unexpected death of her only brother, Nelly becomes the premier debutante overnight.
Nelly Sawyer is the daughter of the wealthiest Negro in America, whose affluence catapulted his family to the heights of Black society.
A fire of vice and virtue rages on every shore, and Chicago is its beating heart.
The year is 1921, and America is burning.
When a rich Black debutante enlists the help of a low-level speakeasy manager to identify the head of an underground crime syndicate, the two are thrust into the dangerous world of Prohibition-era Chicago.
A debut novel everyone will be talking about, Avery Cunningham\'s epic love story is a triumph and a tale of intrigue, racial tension, and class warfare, set against the glamorous and gritty backdrop of early 20th century Chicago
