Soul City

by Touré Narrated by Kevin R. Free

Overview

Critically acclaimed author TourE's writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The Best American Essays and The New York Times. This playful and hip fantasy is the tale of a utopian city, where residents can attend St. Pimp's House of Baptist Rapture, and the candidates for mayor battle to determine who the better DJ is. Into this wonderful place comes Cadillac Jackson, a journalist who falls for the beautiful and magical Mahogany Sunflower- whose family members can fly.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

In a swamp of political mudslinging tomes, this charming and quirky fairy tale for grownups comes as a restful change. Stem-cell clashes? Foreign policy? Forget it. The mayoral race in Soul City hinges on one issue and one issue only: which candidate will make the best DJ, pumping the hippest music into the speakers that hang from every lamppost in the city. The citizens of this grooving utopia, which boasts "more mojo than any city in the world," are entirely separated from the rest of America, and they like it that way; it leaves them free to devour Granmama's biscuits by the bushel, drive around in cars that play only the driver's favorite singer, and attend St. Pimp's House of Baptist Rapture. When Cadillac Jackson, a journalist from Chocolate City magazine, arrives to write an article about the election, he promptly falls in love with the seductive Mahogany Sunflower, but even more so with the city itself the only place left in America where black really is beautiful. Imaginative, buoyant and slyly funny, this satire by magazine writer Tour (The Portable Promised Land) is a delight to read and a pleasure to hum along to. Agent, Sarah Lazin. 5-city author tour. (Sept. 2) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

In this highly entertaining debut novel, Tour expands on the magical characters he introduced in his story collection, The Portable Promised Land, pulling together aspects of African American culture within a utopian setting called Soul City. Cadillac Jackson, a reporter for Chocolate City Magazine, arrives in the city to cover the mayoral election and falls in love with a woman named Mahogany, whose family can fly like birds. She is one of many distinct characters, including the boy preacher, Lil' Mo Love, who tells amusing stories about a slave who continually outsmarts his white master; Cool Spreadlove, who wins the mayoral election and spins his soul music throughout the city; and Ecstasy, who runs a hug shop where citizens pay for a rejuvenating embrace. Numerous literary and musical anecdotes run through this imaginative story, which ultimately examines African American stereotypes against a political backdrop of power and greed. This is a cleverly written page-turner whose only disappointment is that it has to end. Highly recommended; public libraries should order additional copies. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/04.]-David A. Berone, Univ. of New Hampshire Lib., Durham Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Well, what other name would you give paradise?It's not clear exactly how to react to a debut novel that's purportedly meant for adults yet whose first page introduces journalist Cadillac Jackson getting off the train in Soul City (where he's been sent by Chocolate City Magazine to cover the mayoral elections) and fully intending to check out the sights that include the world-famous 100-foot Afro pick and the "crazy" sermons delivered by Revren Lil' Mo Love. Is this the start of a bad dream that our protagonist is going to wake up from? No, dear reader, music journalist Toure (stories: The Portable Promised Land, 2002) has his story and he runs with it, for better or for worse. True enough, Cadillac keeps his clear intention of probing into the city to see what's going on with the mayoral election, but obviously that's really just a stratagem allowing him to tour the length and the breadth of this slice of paradise: where the biscuits are made with droplets of heaven-sent butter, the music is everywhere and always the best (Ellington, Prince, Marley), and there's a gorgeous Jimmy Choo-wearing femme fatale by the name of Mahogany Sunflower for Cadillac to fall in love with. There's evil, too, of course, personified in places like the nearby thug paradise of Whatevaworld and in the figure of vile billionaire tycoon John Jiggaboo. The battle for the soul of Soul City is joined only somewhat late in this thinly imagined romp, which keeps its bouncy spirit even while failing utterly to function as a racial metaphor in the manner of a Colson Whitehead or Suzan-Lori Parks, though it seems to wish to. Not half as imaginative as it may think, yet still fun in a grandly silly fashion.

From the Publisher

"Magical . . . lyrically described."—Entertainment Weekly

"Touré fulfills his promise in [this] inventive debut novel."—Vanity Fair

"Try to imagine Ronald Firbank with a street swagger, and you have some idea of the high style of Touré's Soul City. . . . Touré's experimental fiction makes him the young man to watch in the literary arena."—Tom Wolfe

"Imaginative, buoyant, and slyly funny, this satire . . . is a delight to read and a pleasure to hum along to."—Publishers Weekly

Product Details

BN ID:	2940170644322
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	06/12/2009
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

Soul City

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By Toure

Little, Brown

Copyright © 2004 Toure
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0-316-74158-2

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Chapter One

THE TRAIN eased to a stop at Soul City, and Cadillac Jackson smoothed off into a new life. He had a pen in one hand and a pad in the other, hungry to catch every detail. He was from The City and infused with the requisite towering ambition that everyone from The City had. He'd come to Soul City to research the book that would establish him as one of the great writers of his generation. Whether he had the talent to render the world of Soul City honestly remained to be seen. He'd been sent by Chocolate City Magazine, ordered to spend three days, write a short piece about the mayoral election, and get back home. But he had other plans. He'd always wanted to visit the city that boasted "more mojo than any city in the world." To see the world-famous one-hundred-foot-tall Afro Pick, to hear one of Revren Lil' Mo Love's crazy sermons, to get a sack of six at the Biscuit Shop. And he'd always wanted to write a book about Soul City. He knew all the other books had gotten it wrong. No one had really figured out what made Soul City what it was. He vowed not to leave until he knew. Great books had been inspired by Dublin, Venice, Paris, Bombay, and New York. He would add Soul City.

Cadillac stepped out of the station onto Groove Street and saw men cooling down the block with walks of such visible rhythm, physical artistry, and attention to aesthetics that it looked like a pimp-stroll convention. Across the street a barber was clipping and snipping at a prodigious fro in an open-air barbershop, clipping with the arrogance of a famous painter wielding his brush, snipping whether in or out of the fro, turning those scissors into a snare. On the corner a street sweeper swept with a theatricality that transformed his duty into modern dance.

On Mojo Road a flock of girls double-dutched, pigtails bouncing, the rope cracking at lightning speed, while the three in the middle danced in the air, never touching the ground. They seemed to be levitating, but those ropes were moving so fast it was difficult to tell exactly what was going on. Maybe the ropes were whipping up a mini-sonic boom that created a pocket of air that the girls could surf for a moment, like an invisible magic carpet. That made no sense. But what he saw made no sense either: six- and seven-year-old girls in rainbow-colored tights with ropes zipping under their bent legs eight, nine, ten times before they touched the sidewalk. They touched down less from gravity than from boredom, as if they'd been just hanging out in the air.

He checked into his hotel, the Copasetic on Cool Street, then walked from Nappy Lane to Gravy Ave to Cornbread Boulevard. The sidewalks were forty to fifty feet wide and the streets were abuzz with all-age minifestivals of hair braiding, marble shooting, bubble blowing, puddle stomping, roller-skating, faithful preaching, "God's coming!," mommies strolling, babies toddling, groceries spilling, lots of flirting, and gossip flying. On Bookoo Boulevard the Vinylmobile crept by, offering old albums for a few dollars, and children poured from homes to chase it as children elsewhere chase ice cream trucks. The Washeteria on Badass Ave had its own DJ so you could dance while you dried. And it made perfect sense that in a world where bad means good, the traffic signals used green for stop and red for go.

On Irie Way and Downhome Drive he found flowers leaping up through the sidewalks. They were American beauties and African violets, more vibrant, fragrant, and giant than any he'd ever seen. He bent and saw their roots were buried beneath the concrete. The flowers had confronted the pavement and punched through it, undeterrable in their desire to get closer to the sun. Bent low, he could see the little speakers that had been built into the sidewalks all over town. First he heard Satchmo think to himself what a wonderful world, then Bob spoke of redemption songs, then James proclaimed he was Black and he was proud. There was an easy vibe to the place, as if everything in the world were possible and there was all the time in the world to do it, for Soul City minutes were ninety seconds long. Cadillac tried to scribble a few words that would capture the scene, but nothing came.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Soul City by Toure Copyright © 2004 by Toure. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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