Jackson’s Survival story snapped up by Dialogue

Dialogue Books has signed an "electrifying" memoir on race and class from writer Mitchell S Jackson in a two-book deal.

Publisher Sharmaine Lovegrove bought UK and Commonwealth rights from Charles Buchan at the Wylie Agency. Memoir Survival Math will be published in e-book on 26th March, hardback on 26th September and paperback in 2020. A novel, The Residue Years, will follow in May 2020.

Exploring race, masculinity, gangs and guns, near-death experiences and composite fathers, Survival Math takes its name from the calculations Jackson made to survive the Portland, Oregon of his youth.

The Residue Years is a novel that exposes readers to the experience of “growing up black in the whitest city in the US”. The blurb says: “Drug abuse is rife, and mayhem is the norm, the story switches perspective from Champ, a young man who dreams of a life bigger that what is in front of him and his mother Grace who is struggling to stay clean. It’s a book that explores love, weakness and the battle to defy the life you have been given.”

Jackson said: “I am thrilled, so thrilled, to join the burgeoning roster of authors at Dialogue Books. While Survival Math is grounded in the stories of my family and friends in Oregon, it also speaks to the larger history of black Americans, which as we know, is inseparable from the history of Americans of European descent. And to be published by Sharmaine—an accomplished black woman—makes this honour that much more meaningful to me. As I’m loyalist, I hope this the beginning of a long and fruitful relationship”.

Lovegrove added: “Both books are incredibly important as they have that special ability to connect with the reader and create deep empathy and enlightenment which is the aim for Dialogue, we are delighted Mitchell has found a home with us.”