{"product_id":"the-broken-king-9780802120144","title":"The Broken King","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eONE OF THE \u003ci\u003eNEW YORK TIMES\u003c\/i\u003e’S 100 NOTABLE BOOKS OF THE YEAR\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e“There’s a bridge of beautiful American prose—lyrical, powerful, fearlessly candid—running straight from James Baldwin to Thomas, who is obviously Baldwin’s worthy heir . . . An utterly immersive book.”—Francisco Goldman, author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist \u003ci\u003eMonkey Boy\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFrom the author of \u003ci\u003eMan Gone Down\u003c\/i\u003e—a \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e Top Ten Book of the Year and winner of the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award—comes a deeply personal memoir of race, trauma, alcoholism, parenting, mental illness and ultimately hope in a portrait of three generations of Black American men\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn 2007, Michael Thomas launched into the literary world with his award-winning first novel \u003ci\u003eMan Gone Down\u003c\/i\u003e, a beautiful and devastating story of a Black father trying to claim a piece of the American Dream. Called “powerful and moving . . . an impressive success,” by Kaiama L. Glover on the cover of the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e, Thomas’ debut introduced a writer of prodigious and rare talent. In his long-awaited encore and first work of nonfiction, \u003ci\u003eThe Broken King\u003c\/i\u003e, Thomas explores fathers and sons, lovers and the beloved, trauma and recovery, success and failure in a unique, urgent, and timeless memoir.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title is borrowed from T.S. Eliot’s line in “Little Gidding”: “If you came at night like a broken king,” and the work ponders the process of being broken. Akin to Baldwin’s \u003ci\u003eThe Fire Next Time\u003c\/i\u003e or Nabokov’s \u003ci\u003eSpeak, Memory\u003c\/i\u003e, Thomas’ memoir unfolds through six powerful, interlocking and overlaying parts focusing on the lives of five men: his father—a philosopher, Boston Red Sox fan, and absent parent; his estranged older brother; his two sons growing up in Brooklyn; and always, heartbreakingly himself. At the center of \u003ci\u003eThe Broken King\u003c\/i\u003e is the story of Thomas’ own breakdown, a result of inherited family history and his own experiences, from growing up Black in the Boston suburbs to publishing a prize-winning novel with “the house of Beckett.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvery page of \u003ci\u003eThe Broken King\u003c\/i\u003e rings with the impact of America’s sweeping struggle with race and class, education and family, and builds to a brave, meticulous articulation of a creative mind’s journey into and out of madness.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Michael Thomas","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42969611141238,"sku":"9780802120144","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0671\/1374\/6550\/files\/CoreSourceHub_69cd1f57-7eba-4f60-b9f2-ba08c1d1ec29.jpg?v=1768217235","url":"https:\/\/ingramacademic.com\/products\/the-broken-king-9780802120144","provider":"Ingram Academic \u0026 Professional","version":"1.0","type":"link"}