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Random House
July 2007
On Sale: July 3, 2007
288 pages
ISBN: 0375509275
EAN: 9780375509278
Hardcover
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Fiction Poetry
Fresh out of graduate school, Holly Mattox is a young, newly
married, and spirited poet who moves to New York City from
Minnesota in the early 1970’s. Hoping to share her passion
for words and social justice, Holly is also determined to
contribute to the politically charged atmosphere around her.
Her mission: to successfully teach a poetry workshop at the
Women’s House of Detention on Rikers Island, only minutes
from Manhattan. Having listened to her mother recite verse by heart all her
life, Holly has always been drawn to poetry. Yet until she
stands before a class made up of prisoners and detainees–all
troubled women charged with a variety of crimes–even Holly
does not know the full power that language can possess.
Words are the only weapon left to many of these outspoken
women: the hooker known as Baby Ain’t (as in “Baby Ain’t
Nobody Better!”); Gene/Jean, who is mid-sex change; drug
mule Never Delgado; and Akilah Malik, a leader of the Black
Freedom Front. One woman in particular will change Holly’s life forever:
Polly Lyle Clement, an inmate awaiting transfer to a mental
hospital upstate, one day announces that she is a descendant
of Mark Twain and is capable of channeling his voice. And so
begins Holly’s descent into the dark recesses of the
criminal justice system, where in an attempt to understand
and help her students she will lose her perspective on the
nature of justice–and risk ruining everything stable in her
life. As Holly begins an affair with a fellow poet–who claims to know her better than she
knows herself–she finds herself adrift between two ends of
the social and political spectrum, between two men and two
identities. National Book Award finalist Carol Muske-Dukes has created
an explosive, mesmerizing novel exploring the worlds of
poetry, sex, and politics in the unforgettable New York City
of the seventies. Written with her trademark captivating
language and emotional intuition, Channeling Mark Twain is
Muske-Dukes’s most powerful work to date.
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