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Content snapshot
Flag an inaccuracy →What's in this book, at a glance — five things readers want to know before they start.
Violence
Some
A flashback to childhood abuse; physical confrontation; some violence
Language
Some
Moderate language; academic-social dialogue
Sexual Content
A lot
Explicit M/M sexual content
Substance Use
Some
Graduate student party drinking; social drugs
Emotional Intensity
A lot
Racial fatigue in white academic spaces, internalized trauma from a violent childhood, the complexity of desire
What this book is about
Wallace is a Black, gay PhD student in biochemistry at a Midwestern university. He spends a single summer weekend navigating the complicated dynamics of his white, mostly straight friend group — the microaggressions, the assumptions, the exhaustion of being the only one. An unexpected and difficult physical relationship with another man ruptures the surface of things. Brandon Taylor's debut is one of the sharpest portraits of racial fatigue in contemporary literary fiction.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
explicit M/M sexual content
childhood abuse in backstory
racial dynamics in academic settings
Reader Verification
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