"[A] sensational new novel about the tenacity of racism and its bizarre permutations... bounce[s] off the page with the sharpest, wittiest, most unsettling cultural criticism I've read in years... Hannaham is a propulsive storyteller... the whole story speeds through the dark... never takes its foot off the gas... An archetypal tale of American struggle... Reminiscent of Edward P. Jones's The Known World...[A] fantastically creative performance... [An] insightful and ultimately tender novel... You will devour this book." —Ron Charles, Washington Post
"A writer of major importance... Moments of deft lyricism are Hannaham's greatest strength, and those touches of beauty and intuitive metaphor make the novel's difficult subject matter easier to bear... The novel's finest moments are... in the singular way that Hannaham can make the commonplace spring to life with nothing more than astute observations and precise language."—New York Times Book Review
"Hannaham's prose is gloriously dense and full of elegant observations that might go unmade by a lesser writer. There is a great warmth in this novel that tackles darkness... [Hannaham] creates full-bodied characters. Even the minor figures are drawn with subtle details... Hannaham's decision to give a voice to crack—in the character Scotty—occasions some lively and inventive writing. Scotty has swagger and a sly sense of humor, and when he narrates he holds your attention... The character is complex, both tender and ruthless... A grand, empathetic, and funny novel about addiction, labor exploitation, and love... Delicious Foods should be read for its bold narrative risks, as well as the heart and humor of its author's prose."—Roxane Gay, Bookforum
"Harrowing... Hannaham details a cycle of despair and enslavement in the poverty-ridden South... What emerges is the powerful tale of a place whose past is 'a ditch so deep with bodies it could pass for a starless night.'"
—The New Yorker
"Delicious Foods has plenty of magic in it, and plenty of tragedy... A powerful allegory about modern-day slavery, Delicious Foods explores the ways that even the most extraordinary black men and women are robbed of the right to control their own lives... [Hannaham] is serious about investigating the long-term effects of internalized racism, and the despair that prevents people from helping themselves... A sharp critique of the American belief that you can do anything as long as you work hard."—Entertainment Weekly
"The novel's unforgettable cast... satisfies all our readerly cravings and without ostentation... The story's twists are at times implausible but nonetheless are a great feat of imagination. Hannaham has put his characters in the perfect conditions for these issues to play out—and for us to believe them... From what we've seen go down at Delicious, from the tenacity of this mother and son, we know it's love that keeps us going. Love is a rock every bit as hard as those diamond stars. Its indestructible beauty is enough to break down the earthly rocks that are its meager imitations."—The Rumpus
"James Hannaham's satirical and darkly humorous look at racism, drugs, and the American South begins intensely... and doesn't let up... This brutal and beautiful tome is irresistible."
—USA Today
"Delicious Foods is not a story about the death of the American Dream, but an illumination of the fantasies that surround it, and the denial that permits us to believe in its innocence. It is also a compelling and haunting tale of family, responsibility, and endurance."—Guernica
"An audacious, heartbreaking story... that is intended to be allegorical, but unearths a horror that is real and whose roots reach all the way back to slavery... Hannaham brilliantly creates a metaphor for human trafficking, modern-day industrialism, the pernicious effects of the war on drugs, and society's greedy need for 'quality' delivered as cheaply as possible... Delicious Foods stay[s] in the mind... A breathtaking depiction of how difficult is to break a spirit down, and how stubborn and resilient people can be. "—Maclean's
"Strange and often haunting, Hannaham's brilliant look at the parent and child relationship, and the things that can tear that normally unbreakable bond apart, could be one of the best novels of 2015."—Men's Journal
"Disturbing and addictive... This dark story is horrific, engrossing, deeply moving, and surprisingly funny at times... The subject matter in this tale of survival is uncomfortable and unfortunately all-too believable, but Hannaham's inventive storytelling and care for his characters fill this bleak world with much needed hope and love. Delicious Foods is hard to swallow at times, but also hard to put down."—Winnipeg Free Press
"In lesser hands, Delicious Foods could easily have been a dark and dreary saga of misery and pain. Instead, Hannaham gleefully rides the lightness. There is no dwelling in sorry here—only movement to find a way forward to something better. No matter how bad things get, you are breathing, you are alive. Therein lies the joy."—The Root
"Delicious Foods is a tale both hopeful and tragic, of the triumph of the human spirit, and the cruelties of man and nature...Delicious Foods is, above all else, an American story: a story of slavery and power, defiance and grit, and hope for a better day."
—Cedar Rapids Gazette
"Delicious Foods is an epic and devastating hero's journey... [It] is the result of a master storyteller at the top of his game. Don't miss it."—Buzzfeed Books
"Hannaham's new book begins with one of the strongest openings for a novel in recent memory... Propelled by the force of the questions raised by those opening lines, Delicious Foods progresses with an almost hallucinogenic fervor."—National Post
"This is a book of astonishing originality and power. In Delicious Foods, James Hannaham has created a wholly new world—a hallucinatory place shot through with struggle and terrible deeds—but one never lacking light or hope. Hannaham reinvents the Southern gothic with prose at once brutal and lyrical and drop-dead gorgeous. This is a hell of a novel."
—Dave Eggers, author of A Hologram for the King and The Circle
"James Hannaham's new novel is a tour de force. Gripping, haunting, and deeply moving, it beguiles the reader with the urgent immediacy of its characters' lives, while also reverberating with universal themes of freedom and enslavement, love and survival."—Jennifer Egan, Pulitzer Prize winner for A Visit from the Goon Squad
"Delicious Foods is a strange and compelling American horror story, arrived at through fresh narrative strategies. A mother, a son, drugs, workers enslaved in a gruesome nightmare, love and survival—this is a wonderfully conjured novel."
—Daniel Woodrell, New York Times bestselling author of The Maid's Version and Winter's Bone
"Bury me with this book, so I will remember how wonderful living was—the food, the words, the stories, the places, the feeling of freedom. Delicious Foods is a magnificent novel, full of beauty a great writer can make of even the most terrifying parts of life."—Rebecca Lee, author of Bobcat
"Delicious Foods is virtuosity on a hire wire—a wild, romping, brilliant plot, capped off with bodacious characters and breathtaking prose. A completely unforgettable, original, and singular novel by a brave, exciting new writer."
—Tayari Jones, author of Silver Sparrow
"A comic novel about family, addiction, and getting in too deep."—O Magazine
"An audacious novel about poverty, grief, addiction and the bond between mother and son—told with a ferocious voice not unlike those of previous Discover selections Ruby by Cynthia Bond and Southern Cross the Dog by Bill Cheng."—Shelf Awareness
"A Southern farm provides the backdrop for a modern-day slavery tale in this textured, inventive and provocatively funny novel... A poised and nervy study of race in a unique voice."
—Kirkus (starred review)
"Delicious Foods is fiercely imaginative and passionate. There are echoes here of Ralph Ellison and Zora Neale Hurston, even at times of Zola or Kafka. The investigation of Nat's disappearance is not the only instance of racism in law enforcement; in that respect, the novel is timely, even prophetic. Few novels leap off the page as this one does.Delicious Foods is a cri de coeur from a very talented and engaging writer."—Bookpage (Top Pick of the Month)
"With its ragged Southern vernacular, clever personification, and horrific opening scene, Delicious Foods is violent and grim, but it's ultimately a reminder of how, amid poverty and addiction, love can prevail."—Out Magazine
"If The Great Gatsby was the Great American Novel of the twentieth century, Delicious Foods could be that of the early twenty-first. If the plot sounds like tough going, Hannaham's masterpiece is anything but. The writing makes it "great," and the themes of pain, forgiveness, exploitation, and self creation make it American. It is simply unmissable."
—Booklist (starred review)
"Hannaham's seductive and disturbing second novel grips the reader from page one... The light he shines on the realities of racial injustice, human trafficking, drug abuse, and exploitation make a deep imprint on the reader. But as devastating as Darlene, Eddie, and the other laborers' situations become, the heroic themes of love, forgiveness, and redemption carry this memorable story."—Publisher's Weekly (Starred Review)
"This talented author conveys the story as no other could, except possibly Tony Morrison, as in The Bluest Eye. But Hannaham may actually surpass Morrison's considerable talents in conveying the darkness of our struggles."—Peter Kelton, The Examiner
★ 01/26/2015
Hannaham's (God Says No) seductive and disturbing second novel grips the reader from page one. In the prologue, 17-year-old Eddie has escaped from a farm somewhere in Louisiana, terrified he's headed closer to a place "where someone might capture or kill him, away toward freedom." Hannaham safely delivers Eddie into a new life, though one full of agonizing memories, "like dark birds poised to attack him." The narrative then shifts back to the story of Eddie's mother, Darlene, an educated woman devastated by the loss her husband, Nat, a community organizer in a small town in Louisiana. In her grief, Darlene disappears into a fog of drug use; Scotty, who is the book's charismatic narrator for most of the proceedings, is in fact the literal personification of crack ("Her idea of heaven was that the two of us could kick it together without nobody judging our relationship"). When Darlene is lured into taking a job on a mysterious farm, "it felt like the first luck Darlene had touched in the whole six years since she lost Nat." Instead, it's a horror show of human suffering, through which Darlene and Eddie struggle to reunite. Hannaham's skill at portraying the worst of human experience while keeping you glued to the page—and totally taken with the characters—is nothing short of magic. The light he shines on the realities of racial injustice, human trafficking, drug abuse, and exploitation make a deep imprint on the reader. But as devastating as Darlene, Eddie, and the other laborers' situations become, the heroic themes of love, forgiveness, and redemption carry this memorable story. (Mar.)
Author James Hannaham—who is clearly comfortable behind the mic—skillfully narrates a story of human exploitation, addiction, and grief. It’s all told with dark humor and lightened by a unique point of view: that of “Scotty,” the crack cocaine that slyly takes over the mind of Darlene, who has fallen from respectability after her husband's murder. Hannaham creates distinct moods and voices for his characters, the best of which is the jaunty, smart-talking Scotty, who allows Darlene to be lured to a labor camp, where she's effectively enslaved and isolated from her son. The rhythms of Hannaham's performance reflect the changes in the emotional atmosphere of her son’s journey to find his mother and free her from her bonds. C.B.L. © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine
★ 2015-01-07
A Southern farm provides the backdrop for a modern-day slavery tale in this textured, inventive and provocatively funny novel.The second novel by Hannaham (Creative Writing/Pratt Institute; God Says No, 2009) opens with a harrowing prologue: Eddie, a black 17-year-old, is manically driving a truck from a Louisiana plantation that he's escaped. His hands have been cut off for reasons not explained till the end of the novel, and he's desperate to get to Minnesota. The story then snaps back to six years earlier, as Eddie's mother, Darlene, descends into crack addiction after the murder of her husband, a shop owner and community organizer who fell afoul of local bigots. While working as a prostitute, she and other addicts and indigents are corralled by a woman into a van and coerced to sign a contract that effectively makes them the property of Delicious Foods, a produce farm that plies its workers with drugs and alcohol to extract cheap, unquestioning labor. What's so funny about any of that? Partly Hannaham's daring approach to style and point of view: Much of the novel is narrated by the crack Darlene is addicted to. Nicknamed Scotty, the drug first shows up as a few rocks in her purse as she works the streets and throughout has a voice like the devil on your shoulder. ("I rushed into the few doubting and unbelieving parts left in Darlene's mind and I shouted, Babygirl, surrender to yes! Say yes to good feelings!") The plot turns on Darlene's struggles at Delicious Foods and Eddie's efforts to find her, and in the process, Hannaham finds room to comment on and satirize a variety of racial (and racist) iconographies, from watermelons to David Duke to voodoo to the sexual demands of plantation owners. In that context, the fate of Eddie's hands becomes a potent allegory for centuries of black men and women stripped of the power to control their destinies. A poised and nervy study of race in a unique voice.
