This is my first Percival Everett book, and because the story is a retelling of 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' by Mark Twain, I am not really sure what I would get if I picked up another different Everett book. The book is unique. Everett had focused on a number of elements in the original book and cleverly woven them into this story, in a completely novel way. I haven't read Huckleberry Finn, but I have a copy and know that Twain uses dialect as a key tool within that story. For Everett, he also takes up language, but plays it in a novel way, giving the slaves no dialect when they are speaking to each other, but emphasising it when they are speaking to their masters. Everett suggests that the slaves dumb down their talk to allow (or maybe to ensure) that the white people feel superior. The technique and execution is masterful. The other big change to the original, is that where as the first story is told from Huckleberry's perspective, this one gives the voice to Jim. This allows Everett to elevate Jim and demonstrate the intelligence and worldly experience that he has. The result is that within the first few chapters you are clear that people are 'people' and each person is from this point in the story judged on the merit of their character, what they do and how they act, not their skin colour or their position in society. I think this is quite powerful. The synopsis otherwise is very similar to Huckleberry Finn, an adventure that sees Jim and Huckleberry pitted together, Huckleberry escaping the cruelty of his father and Jim fleeing the rumours that he was about to be sold, they unite on an island in the river. The adventure unfolds, but this time telling the parts of James' story when he and Finn are separated. I can see why this book is the Booker Short List people's choice. It is a fantastic adventure, it is incredibly accessible (not always something linked with Booker prize short lists) and has been written with excellent execution. I finished it in a flurry. With the Booker Short Lists, there is often a theme that runs across them. This year, it is that most are deeply introspective, beautiful prose and lots of deliberation. But this book, while Jim does share internal thoughts about his family and his predicament, it is more plot focused than most of the others, and as a result, I don't think this one will win. I think the judges want something more lyrical and poignant. But while I don't think this one will win the Booker, it will win such a great following. This is not to say that the book is light. It is told in a style that lends itself to the adventure, but the deep issues of racism, fear, slavery and cruelty are always there. This is all the more clear when Jim is not with Huck, and so I suppose that Everett may have had more opportunity to reflect the difficulty, impossibility, of being a slave during this time. All in all, I loved the journey. My only slight criticism was that I felt that it all wrapped up a little fast. The book moves at quite a pace, but the ending, the last 24 pages almost felt to me like there was an unnatural hurry to it. I would have liked the conclusion to have been given more attention and explanation. A great story that will appeal to a wide audience!

You don't need to have read 'Huckleberry Finn' to enjoy 'James', but Everett's shift in perspective and filling in the blanks of Twain's masterpiece works brilliantly if you are familiar with it. Without reference to the original tale, what we have is an exciting, shocking, witty and deeply humane odyssey - a sort of road (or river) novel, where the central character is utterly compelling and believable; the titular escaped slave is shocked by the brutality he finds in himself. The title character's dignity is not 'dignity in the face of inhumanity', it is simply innate human dignity. Initially I found the conceit of the slaves' different languages - one for the white owners, one amongst themselves - irritating. However, this works well as the novel goes on and serves to put distance between the Harper Lee / Uncle Tom white liberal view of race in America. Interestingly, Everett does not go for the harrowing descriptions of the brutalising of Black Americans in the way that, for example, Morrison does in 'Beloved'. And this, perhaps, is what gives the novel its power; the moments of shock, the casual brutality and grinding horror of the slaves' lives is served well by the author's restraint. It is a great novel - lively, and beautifully constructed, with the river serving as a connecting theme to the tautly constructed narrative in a similar way that Dickens used the Thames in 'Great Expectations' and 'Our Mutual Friend'. Mostly, what I found myself enjoying is the compelling nature of the narrative. It is a thrilling, thrilling novel and one which should cement Everett's place as one of the great contemporary American novelists.

James is a retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the viewpoint of the runaway slave known then as Jim. It’s a long time since I read Huckleberry Finn but from what I remember, James sticks quite closely to the incidents of the original and it’s a really interesting take to see it from the other point of view. Things we had seen from Huck’s point of view look altogether different now and there are some interesting plot twists too. The writing is absolutely beautiful and there is real life breathed into James and the other slaves, as we see how far they have to hide their true selves from the whites they encounter and how trapped they are by the whims of those around them. My only issue is that I would have loved to have known what happens next! An amazing read. It’s the first book I’ve read by Percival Everett but I’ll definitely be looking out the others.

James by Percival Everett I first read Huckleberry Finn when I was 12 years old. It was our class reader - red, tatty and with countless other pupils names crossed out inside the front cover. My enduring memory was one of a rousing adventure around The Mississippi River. Now, over 40 years later, reacquainted with Huck and slave Jim, is an opportunity to relive some of those adventures seen through Jim’s eyes. I’m not sure if it is this new interpretation, my advancing age or whether my recollection is clouded by the passing of so many years, but the adventure, although much in evidence, is greatly overshadowed by the despicable racism and unbearable cruelty of slave era America. Jim, now James is able to show us, the readers, his bravery and intellect, instead of hiding it from the white folks of the story. This is a magnificently paced, beautifully written novel.It is also a reminder that the value of human life in monetary terms is an abomination; of the wretchedness and absurdity of intolerance. One of the books of the year. #docs.reading.room

I'd read The Trees before this, and this is a totally different ride! James is funny, irreverent and hugely thought provoking. I couldn't stop thinking about him long after I'd finished reading. I could see the journey, the people, the places. I'd put it down, keep thinking about it, pick it up, couldn't stop. I had to finish. There were parts that made me weep, made me laugh, make me so angry...but throughout the book I never stopped 'feeling' something. What a journey!