Books › Long Division
Long Division
304 pages
A razor-sharp, time-bending Southern odyssey that wrestles with the ghosts of history through the eyes of a fiercely witty Black teenager.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like stepping into a surreal, time-bending funhouse mirror of the American South, where history is never truly past. The narrative moves at a brisk, unpredictable clip, anchored by a teenage voice that is simultaneously hilarious, vulnerable, and devastatingly sharp. It is a deeply atmospheric experience, steeped in the humid, haunted reality of Mississippi, blending the speculative thrill of time travel with the heavy, grounded truths of systemic racism and intergenerational trauma. The prose crackles with vernacular energy and meta-fictional playfulness, demanding your full attention as it weaves between eras. It will absolutely delight readers who crave genre-defying literary fiction that uses speculative elements not as mere plot devices, but as profound tools to dissect race, legacy, and the bittersweet journey of Black boyhood.
- Mood
- surreal
- bittersweet
- atmospheric
- haunted
- Tone
- satirical
- tender
- wry
- lacerating
- earnest
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- Black boyhood · the weight of history · intergenerational trauma · systemic racism · the illusion of time
- The writing
- Colloquial, razor-sharp, and rhythmically inventive, blending Southern vernacular with meta-fictional playfulness.
- The arc
- Moves from bewildered, defensive adolescence through surreal historical reckoning to a profound, bittersweet understanding of self and legacy.
- Who it's for
- Readers who love genre-bending literary fiction, sharp social commentary, and deeply authentic, funny teenage voices grappling with heavy historical truths.
Content notes
- racism and racial slurs
- Ku Klux Klan violence
- bullying
- child disappearance
About the book
Kiese Laymon's debut novel is a Twain-esque exploration of celebrity, authorship, violence, religion, and coming of age in Post-Katrina Mississippi, written in a voice that's alternately funny, lacerating, and wise. The book contains two interwoven stories. In the first, it's 2013: after an on-stage meltdown during a nationally televised quiz contest, 14-year-old Citoyen "City" Coldson becomes an overnight YouTube celebrity. The next day, he's sent to stay with his grandmother in the small coastal community of Melahatchie, where a young girl named Baize Shephard has recently disappeared. Before leaving, City is given a strange book without an author called "Long Division." He learns that one of the book's main characters is also named City Coldson,but "Long Division" is set in 1985. This 1985 City, along with his friend and love-object, Shalaya Crump, discovers a way to travel into the future, and steals a laptop and cellphone from an orphaned teenage rapper called...Baize Shephard. They ultimately take these with them all the way back to 1964, to help another time-traveler they meet protect his family from the Klan. City's two stories ultimately converge in the mysterious work shed behind his grandmother's, where he discovers the key to Baize's disappearance.
Description from Open Library.
Books like Long Division
See why they match
Salvage the BonesJesmyn WardA lush, mythic, and devastatingly tender portrait of a family bracing for the storm of a lifetime.
Crooked letter, crooked letterTom FranklinA sweltering, slow-burn Southern mystery steeped in the melancholy of lost friendship and the inescapable gravity of small-town secrets.
Sing, Unburied, SingWard JesmynA haunting, lyrical road trip through the ghosts of the American South, where the past bleeds heavily into the present.
HeavyKiese LaymonAn unflinching, beautifully rhythmic exploration of the physical and emotional weight of generational trauma and systemic racism.
Lovecraft CountryMatt RuffA pulp-infused road trip where the cosmic horrors of the occult pale in comparison to the everyday terrors of Jim Crow America.
Underground airlinesBen H. WintersA dread-soaked, hardboiled thriller set in a chillingly plausible alternate America that forces a reckoning with complicity and guilt.