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Content snapshot
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Violence
A lot
Political violence including an execution; a terrorism plot; some combat
Language
Some
Adult language
Sexual Content
Barely any
Teen romantic relationship; some intimacy
Substance Use
None
No substance use
Emotional Intensity
A lot
The psychological weight of systematic oppression experienced from the inside; a devastating ending
What this book is about
In an alternate Britain where the racial hierarchy is inverted—Crosses (Black people) hold power and Noughts (white people) are systematically oppressed—Sephy Cross and Callum McGregor have been friends since childhood. As they fall in love, the political and social forces arrayed against them become impossible to ignore. Blackman's inversion of real-world racism is designed to make its mechanisms visible to readers who might not otherwise see them. The novel's ending is genuinely brutal.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
Political violence and an execution in the climax
A devastating ending that requires emotional preparation
The systematic oppression of an entire race as the novel's subject
Reader Verification
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