The Ballad of Black Tom in Around the Year in 52 Books

Nov 20, 2017 Jacqie rated it really liked it

This is a painful book to read. It's a retelling of Lovecraft's "The Horror at Red Hook", if you didn't know, and it interrogates the racism that Lovecraft infused into that story. The author, Victor LaValle, grew up in Brooklyn, and he wants to give a different perspective.
Tommy Tester is a feckless young man who runs harmless games in order to get by. He understands how the world works and where he can go without getting sharp glances and possibly more. As an easy job, he delivers a certain sp ...more

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Feb 05, 2024 Zoë rated it really liked it

Shelves: youre-in-a-cult-call-ur-dad, favorites, sci-fi, read-in-2024, historical-fiction, cant-unsee-that, political-themes, i-own, wtf-did-i-just-read, horror

This was almost everything I could ask for in a Lovecraft retelling/inspired story. I loved Tom's character and felt for his sorrow. I loved the horror and dark justice towards the end. My major gripe about this was having to read from the cop's POV - I think I could've easily read another 200 pages of this if it meant more of Tom. I'm really eager to seek out more Lovecraft retellings along this vein. ...more

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Nov 03, 2017 Cora rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: racism, new-york-city, kindle, new-york-state, supernatural, fantasy, urban-fantasy, horror, novella

The Ballad of Black Tom is a novella that retells one of Lovecraft's worst and most racist stories (The Horror of Red Hook) from the perspective of a young African American man. The author was a fan of Lovecraft as a child and had that admiration shattered later in life when he began to recognize the racist themes of the stories he used to love. Despite this racism, LaValle still liked the monsters and horror of Lovecraft's worlds so he decided to retell one of those stories from the point of vi ...more

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