Prudence Couldn't Swim

Description

White ex-con Cal Winter comes home one day to find his gorgeous young, black wife drowned in the pool. Prudence couldn't swim and Cal concludes she didn't get in the water willingly: he suspects murder. This darkly humorous journey takes readers along with Cal and his prison homie Red Eye as they set out to find the killer, taking them into a world full of the sexual urges of the rich and powerful. Intricate and mesmerising, this racially charged novel reflects strands of the author's own complicated and quixotic life.

James Kilgore was a political activist in the 1960s. He fled the country in 1975 to escape a federal explosives charge, but was arrested 27 years later in Cape Town, South Africa, and served six and a half years in California prisons. During his sentence, he wrote three books, including We Are All Zimbabweans Now and Freedom Never Rests. He is currently a research scholar at the Center for African Studies at the University of Illinois-Champaign. He lives in Champaign, Illinois.

"James Kilgore's writing is a refreshing blend of literary talent and political insight; something sorely missing from much of the fiction penned by writers on the Left. His wit, swift pacing, and dead-on characterization are skillfully woven into an unflinching vision for radical change and social justice. So often we are told that a commitment to radical change and a rollicking good read mix like oil and water. Along comes Kilgore to put that lie to rest!" --Frank B. Wilderson III, author of Incognegro: A Memoir of Exile and Apartheid "James Kilgore is a masterful writer, and as a U.S. activist who has lived in Africa most of his adult life, Kilgore is able to connect us to politics and culture as no other writer. This character-driven mystery promises to find a devoted following." --Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of Blood on the Border: A Memoir of the Contra War.