Ring Shout

By P. Djèlí Clark

Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark returns with Ring Shout, a dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror

“A fantastical, brutal and thrilling triumph of the imagination...Clark’s combination of historical and political reimagining is cathartic, exhilarating and fresh.” —The New York Times

A 2021 Nebula Award Winner
A 2021 Locus Award Winner

A New York Times Editor's Choice Pick!
A Booklist Editor's Choice Pick!

A 2021 Hugo Award Finalist
A 2021 World Fantasy Award Finalist
A 2021 Ignyte Award Finalist
A 2021 Shirley Jackson Award Finalist
A 2021 AAMBC Literary Award Finalist
A 2021 British Fantasy Award Finalist
A 2021 Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award Nominee
A 2020 SIBA Award Finalist
A Goodreads Choice Award Finalist

Named a Best of 2020 Pick for NPR | Library Journal | Book Riot | LitReactor | Bustle | Polygon | Washington Post

IN AMERICA, DEMONS WEAR WHITE HOODS.

In 1915, The Birth of a Nation cast a spell across America, swelling the Klan's ranks and drinking deep from the darkest thoughts of white folk. All across the nation they ride, spreading fear and violence among the vulnerable. They plan to bring Hell to Earth. But even Ku Kluxes can die.

Standing in their way is Maryse Boudreaux and her fellow resistance fighters, a foul-mouthed sharpshooter and a Harlem Hellfighter. Armed with blade, bullet, and bomb, they hunt their hunters and send the Klan's demons straight to Hell. But something awful's brewing in Macon, and the war on Hell is about to heat up.

Can Maryse stop the Klan before it ends the world?


At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Oct 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781250767011

P. Djèlí Clark

Born in New York and raised mostly in Houston, P. DJÈLÍ CLARK (he/him) spent part of his childhood in Trinidad and Tobago, the homeland of his parents. He is the author of the novel A Master of Djinn and the novellas Ring Shout, The Black God’s Drums, and The Haunting of Tram Car 015. He has won the Nebula, Locus, and Alex Awards and been nominated for the Hugo, World Fantasy, and Sturgeon Awards. His stories have appeared in online venues such as Tor.com, Daily Science Fiction, Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Apex, Lightspeed, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and in print anthologies, including Griots, Hidden Youth, and Clockwork Cairo. He is also a founding member of FIYAH Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction and an infrequent reviewer at Strange Horizons.

Book preview

ONE

You ever seen a Klan march?

We don’t have them as grand in Macon, like you might see in Atlanta. But there’s Klans enough in this city of fifty-odd thousand to put on a fool march when they get to feeling to.

This one on a Tuesday, the Fourth of July, which is today.

There’s a bunch parading down Third Street, wearing white robes and pointed hoods. Not a one got their face covered. I hear them first Klans after the Civil War hid behind pillowcases and flour sacks to do their mischief, even blackened up to play like they colored. But this Klan we got in 1922 not concerned with hiding.

All of them—men, women, even little baby Klans—down there grinning like picnic on a Sunday. Got all kinds of fireworks—sparklers, Chinese crackers, sky rockets, and things that sound like cannons. A brass band competing with that racket, though everybody down there I swear clapping on the one and the three. With all the flag-waving and cavorting, you might forget they was monsters.

But I hunt monsters. And I know them when I see them.

One little Ku Klux deaaaad, a voice hums near my ear. Two little Kluxes deaaaad, Three little Kluxes, Four little Kluxes, Five little Kluxes deaaaad.

I glance to Sadie crouched beside me, hair pulled into a long brown braid dangling off a shoulder. She got one eye cocked, staring down the sights on her rifle at the crowd below as she finishes her ditty, pretending to pull the trigger.

Click, click, click, click, click!

Stop that now. I push away the rifle barrel with a beaten-up book. That thing go off and you liable to make me deaf. Besides, somebody might catch sight of us.

Sadie rolls big brown eyes at me, twisting her lips and lobbing a spitty mess of tobacco onto the rooftop. I grimace. Girl got some disgusting habits.

I swear Maryse Boudreaux. She slings her rifle across blue overalls too big for her skinny self and puts hands to her hips to give me the full Sadie treatment, looking like some irate yella gal sharecropper. The way you always worrying. Is you twenty-five or eighty-five? Sometimes I forget. Ain’t nobody seeing us way up here but birds.

She gestures out at buildings rising higher than the telegraph lines of downtown Macon. We up on one of the old cotton warehouses off Poplar Street. Way back, this whole area housed cotton coming in from countryside plantations to send down the Ocmulgee by steamboat. That fluffy white soaked in slave sweat and blood what made this city. Nowadays Macon warehouses still hold cotton, but for local factory mills and railroads. Watching these Klans shamble down the street, I’m reminded of bales of white, still soaked in colored folk sweat and blood, moving for the river.

Not too sure about that, Chef puts in. She sits with her back against the rooftop wall, dark lips curled around the butt of a Chesterfield in a familiar easy smirk. Back in the war, we always watched for snipers. ‘Keep one eye on the mud, one in front, and both up top,’ Sergeant used to say. Somebody yell, ‘Sniper!’ and we scampered quick! Beneath a narrow mustard-brown army cap her eyes tighten and the smirk wavers. She pulls out the cigarette, exhaling a white stream. Hated fucking snipers.

This ain’t no war, Sadie retorts. We both look at her funny. "I mean, it ain’t that kind of war. Nobody down there watching for snipers. Besides, only time you see Winnie is before she put one right between the eyes." She taps her forehead and smiles crookedly, a wad of tobacco bulging one cheek.

Sadie’s no sniper. But she ain’t lying. Girl can shoot the wings off a fly. Never one day in Uncle Sam’s army neither—just hunting with her grandpappy in Alabama. Winnie is her Winchester 1895, with a walnut stock, an engraved slate-gray receiver, and a twenty-four-inch barrel. I’m not big on guns, but got to admit—that’s one damn pretty killer.

All this waiting making me fidgety, she huffs, pulling at the red-and-black-checkered shirt under her overalls. And I can’t pass time reading fairy tales like Maryse.

Folktales. I hold up my book. Say so right on the cover.

Whichever. Stories ’bout Bruh Fox and Bruh Bear sound like fairy tales to me.

Better than those trashy tabloids you like, I retort.

Been told y’all there’s truth in there. Just you watch. Anyway, when we gon’ kill something? This taking too long!

Can’t argue there. Been three-quarters of an hour now we out here and this Macon sun ain’t playing at midday. My nice plaited and pinned-up hair gone damp beneath my tan newsboy cap. Perspiration sticking my striped white shirt to my back. And these gray wool knickers ain’t much better. Prefer a summer dress loose on my hips I can breathe in. Don’t know how men stay all confined like this.

Chef stands, dusting off and taking a last savoring drag on the Chesterfield before stamping it beneath a faded Pershing boot. I’m always impressed by her height—taller than me certainly, and some men for that matter. She lean too, all dark long legs and arms fitted into a tan combat tunic and breeches. Imagine the kaiser’s men musta choked on their sauerkraut seeing her and the Black Rattlers charging in the Meuse-Argonne.

In the trenches only thing living besides us was lice and rats. Lice was damn useless. Rats you could eat. Just had to know the proper bait and trap.

Sadie gags like she swallowed her tobacco. "Cordelia Lawrence, of all the nasty stories you done told about that nasty war, that is by far the nastiest!"

Cordy, you ate rats?

Chef just chuckles before walking off. Sadie looks to me, mimicking throwing up. I tighten the laces on my green gaiters before standing and stuff my book into a back pocket. When I reach Chef she at the other end of the roof, peering off the edge.

Like I say, she picks up again. You want to catch a rat, get the right bait and trap. Then, you just wait him out.

Sadie and I follow her gaze to the alley tucked behind the building, away from the parade and where nobody likely to come. On the ground is our bait. A dog carcass. It’s been cut to pieces, the innards spilled out bloody and pink on the paving stones amid charred black fur. The stink of it carries even up here.

You have to chop it up like that? I ask, my belly unsettled.

Chef shrugs. You want to catch bees, you gotta put out enough honey.

Like how Bruh Fox catch Bruh Rabbit, I imagine my brother saying.

Look like all we catching is flies, Sadie mutters. She leans over the ledge to spit tobacco at the carcass, missing wide.

I cut my eyes to her. Could you be more respectful?

Sadie scrunches up her face, chewing harder. Dog dead. Spit won’t hurt it none.

Still, we can try not to be vulgar.

She snorts. Carrying on over a dog when we put down worse.

I open my mouth, then decide answering ain’t worth the bother.

Macon not missing another stray, Chef says. If it helps, ol’ girl never saw her end coming. She pats the German trench knife at her waist—her prize souvenir. It don’t help. We take to staring at the dog, the hurly-burly of the parade at our backs in our ears.

I wonder why Ku Kluxes like dog? Sadie asks, breaking our quiet.

Seared but bloody, Chef adds. Roasted that one on a spit.

That’s what I’m saying. Why dog and not, say, chicken? Or hogs?

Maybe they ain’t got chickens where they from, or hogs—just got dogs.

"Or something that taste like dog."

My belly could do without this particular conversation, but when Sadie on a rant, best just ride it out.

Maybe I shoulda put some pepper and spices on it, Chef jokes.

Sadie waves her off. White folk don’t care ’bout pepper and spices. Like they food bland as water.

Chef squints over her high cheekbones as loud sky rockets go off, followed by the booms of gas bottle bombs. I dunno. When we was in France, them Frenchies could put they foot on up in some food.

Sadie’s eyes narrow. You talking rats again, Cordy?

Not in the trenches. In Paris, where we was after the armistice. Frenchie gals loved cooking for colored soldiers. Liked doing a heap more than cooking too. She flashes the wink and smile of a rogue. Had us some steak tartare and cassoulet, duck confit, ratatouille—Sadie, fix your face, ratatouille not made from rats.

Sadie don’t look convinced. Well, don’t know what type of white folk they got in France. But the ones here don’t put no proper seasoning in they food unless they got Niggers to do so for ’em. Her eyes widen. I wonder what Niggers smell like to Ku Kluxes? You think Niggers smell like burnt dog to their noses, and that’s why they come after us so? I wonder if there’s even Niggers where they from? And if—

Sadie! I snap, losing what little patience I got. Heaven knows I asked you more than once to stop using that word. At least in my presence?

That yella gal rolls her eyes so hard at me it’s a wonder she don’t fall asleep. "Why you frettin’, Maryse? Always says my Niggers with a big N."

I glare at her. And that make a difference how?

She has the gall to frown like I’m simple. "Why with a big N, it’s respectful like."

Seeing me at a loss, Chef intervenes. "And how can we tell if you using a big N or a common n?"

Now Sadie takes to staring at both of us, like we don’t understand two plus two is four. "Why would I use a small n nigger? That’s insulting!"

I can see Chef’s stumped now too. They could get all the scientists the world over to try and figure out how Sadie’s mind works—wouldn’t do no good. Chef soldiers on anyway. "So can white folk ever use a big N

Reviews for Ring Shout

[Shania24 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Really well written. I enjoyed the whole fantasy vibe of the book even as it stayed true to the undertones and sentiments of a time when black people were hated and seen as less than, for absolutely no good reason.

I loved the magic and science fiction and everything in between!

[Wendi Morata · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This story was really something special. Hit my heart a bit- tear jerker. Dark and twisty in unexpected ways.

[chris.wolak · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Historical SciFi? Dark fantasy? However you want to categorize this novel, it's an excellent read. Wildy creative and suspenseful.

[sriddell_8 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Interesting magical realism/horror book. The premise is a trio of black women fighting waging a resistance war against the Ku Klux Klan in post WWI Georgia - with a big twist that the Ku Klux Klan are actually creatures from another dimension driving by hate.

I love magical realism because literally anything can happen - and this book is full of wild twists and turns.

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

An entertaining short novel set in 1920s Georgia about a Black woman monster hunter fighting interdimensional creatures disguised as Ku Klux Klan members. There's more than a touch of Lovecraft to this, but I enjoyed it as an action-packed horror story and a commentary on the history of racism in America. I also believe it paid homage to [A Wrinkle in Time] - nice.

[jseger9000 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Really enjoyed this one. Well placed, good characters and fantastic world building in such a short novel.Would make a good companion to Lovecraft Country, using horror tropes to talk about the real horrors of racism in the Jim Crow south.The Gullah spoken by one of the characters was often so dense it was impenetrable. But it was nothing that impacted the book overall.

[adaorhell · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Blistering in it's body horror and the perils and worthlessness of hate. Short, brutal, the wet hot pleasure of scratching until it bleeds.

[macha_4 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

great subject matter rooted in black history, and we need a lot more in this area of cross genre. and i will continue to follow his work with enthusiasm, because it's always imaginative and compelling. but this one gets A+ for research, whereas using that to make story exercises different muscles. so this novella needed another pass.

[write5review · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Doing Battle with Haters

What would possess a people to such an extent they would hold another people in bondage, and when freed commit horrible acts to suppress them to guarantee their own status as superior beings? Regarding slavery and Jim Crow in America, several reasons existed, and continue to exist to this day. In P. Djèlí Clark’s raucous novel of vengeance and retribution, an answer is that the Ku Kluxes where monsters.

In this mythology, only a few can penetrate the Ku Kluxes’ guise of human white flesh, though at heart all who don the white sheets, or support the wearers, or simply stand by are monsters. These stalwart few work in bands in various cities throughout the U.S., and a small group of fighters, Gullah women, and socialists in Macon, GA, feature in Ring Shout. The novel effectively blends fantasy, spiritualism, and the supernatural into an explosion of fists, elbows, swords, and gunfire, not to mention the Ring Shout ritual, that will leave readers reaching for the aspirin to stop the ringing its sets off in their minds.

The novel follows the exploits of three intrepid young Black woman, Maryse, Sadie, and Chef as they lead the fight in Macon in 1922. It opens on a set piece of action, the crew doing battle with the Ku Kluxes while the white sheets march in that year’s Fourth of July parade. Maryse emerges as the leader of the group, and she’s the one armed with a supernatural sword packed with the full vengeance of a race enslaved and murdered. She’s also the one who enters a supernatural realm, where she discovers that something big is coming. Turns out the Ku Kluxes plan a giant rally at Stone Mountain, where they will watch The Birth of a Nation. As an aside here, when released in 1915, historians credit the film with the revival of Klan. This reiteration of the Klan occurred in that year at Stone Mountain, and the Klan held a rally there each year Labor Day for around 50 years. Back to the novel. After much intervening action, the Ring Shout culminates in a preternatural battle of good and evil on the mountain.

You might find yourself thinking that imbuing the Ku Kluxes with supernatural possession somehow excuses the actions of ordinary humans; that is, something para human drives their actions. However, Clark cleverly turns this so that hate already possesses regular Klan, and it’s this hate that the supernatural puppet masters feed off of, and that allow for the turning of hate filled monsters into actual monsters. In other words, hated robs you of your humanity. So true.

An all around enjoyable excursion into horror and fantasy and one some not usually readers of the genre might also enjoy. Also, if you watched and enjoyed HBO’s Lovecraft County or reimagined Watchmen, you may be an audience for Ring Shout.

[renbedell · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A horror, science fiction novella about a group of people hunting KKK members that are actually aliens. The storyline is very interesting, which I think would be better if it was a longer book that expanded on it. The book is written well, high action, and comic book like characters.

[liscarey · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really don't read horror, honest.Except, as I've said before, quite recently I think, when I do. P. Djèlí Clark seems to be getting almost a permanent pass for his horror. I don't look at it and say, no, it's horror; I look at it and say, oh, it's Clark.It's the 1920s, with Prohibition, Jim Crow, the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. But this is an alternate America. D. W. Griffith is a sorcerer, and the movie Birth of a Nation is a spell.Not all the Klansmen are humans. Monsters are coming through from somewhere else, and they have their onw agenda, for which the KKK is useful.Three young black women are friends and part of a resistance force against the monsters, which they call Ku Kluxes--Cordelia Lawrence, Sadie Watkins, and Maryse Boudreaux. Maryse is our viewpoint character, with a book of African-American folktales, and a magic sword that comes to her when she needs it. Sadie has her rifle, a Winchester 1895, which she calls Winnie. Cordelia is called Chef by everyone, but she doesn't cook food. She served in WWI, disguised as a man, and is an explosives expert.This little team is, in between running illegal liquor, hunting the monsters they call Ku Kluxes. Chef can set bombs that include silver shot as well as conventional shot; Sadie is a very good shot with Winnie, and if that fails, Maryse can cut the monsters down with her sword. But then they find they're fighting something worse, a new kind of monster, Butcher Clyde, with another, the Grand Cyclops, due to emerge at Stone Mountain, during a grand showing of Birth of a Nation.Battling these monsters means Maryse's group, the black moonshiners they do delivery runs for, Gullah who dance traditional "ring shouts," socialist organizers, and a whole different kind of monsters with a different and more useful agenda working together. Along the way, we learn about Maryse's painful past, the source of the sword and its strengths and weaknesses, something about Gullah tradition. We see Maryse grow painfully, confronting her own greatest fears and at risk of being destroyed by them.This is a really excellent story, revealing and enlightening about the conflicts that existed in our own timeline in the 1920s, and the history behind it.Highly recommended.I got this novella as part of the 2021 Hugo Voters Packet, and am reviewing it voluntarily.

[caseyadamsstark · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Highly imaginative, action packed horrorThree black women in 1920's Macon Georgia hunt a special kind of monster, the Ku Kluxes. Not only that, the book addresses racism and the hate and fear that feeds it. This is the kind of new literary fiction that belongs in our schools, in my opinion. Highly entertaining with a strong cultural significance. And on top of that, a message.Easily a five star read.

[james_knupp · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow, absolutely phenomenal. Clark has the best take on Revisionist Lovecraftian Horror I've read yet. The threat feels real and terrifying in this story. The story doesn't fall into the trap some do when trying to write a tale of historic human evil being linked to something supernatural. Instead of attributing real, human evil to the supernatural, human evil is simply the gateway for something even greater and more powerfully evil. Clark's descriptions are vivid and gripping, and I found myself picturing the monsters with clarity, even when I'd rather not. Highly, highly recommend this one.

[lavaturtle · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Cool, original idea. Great protagonist and supporting cast. I liked the mix of historical horror and fantastical elements.

[richardderus · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Publisher Says: Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark returns with Ring Shout, a dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror.D. W. Griffith is a sorcerer, and The Birth of a Nation is a spell that drew upon the darkest thoughts and wishes from the heart of America. Now, rising in power and prominence, the Klan has a plot to unleash Hell on Earth.Luckily, Maryse Boudreaux has a magic sword and a head full of tales. When she's not running bootleg whiskey through Prohibition Georgia, she's fighting monsters she calls "Ku Kluxes." She's damn good at it, too. But to confront this ongoing evil, she must journey between worlds to face nightmares made flesh—and her own demons. Together with a foul-mouthed sharpshooter and a Harlem Hellfighter, Maryse sets out to save a world from the hate that would consume it.I RECIEVED A REVIEW DRC OF THIS TITLE VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.My Review: Seriously, this would've been a full five-star read had it not been for nine, maybe ten, w-bombs dropped like seagull shit on a picnic. The Birth of a Nation came from a book. Two books really—The Clansman and The Leopard's Spots, by a man named Thomas Dixon. Dixon's father was a South Carolina slaveowner in the Confederacy. And a sorceror.–and–Sadie got it into her head that the Warren G. Harding government knows about Ku Kluxes. Say she pieced it together from the tabloids. That Woodrow Wilson was in on {D.W.} Griffith's plan, but it got out of hand. And now there's secret departments come about since the war, who go round studying Ku Kluxes. Girl got some imagination.That's where we start, mes vieux, that's all in the first thirty or so pages! You are in medias res, and no doubt in your mind that you're not gettin' the full burden of the lyric. To help you along, our generous cicerone Author Clark offers us, in the voice of a crossdressing Harlem Hellfighter, this perfect summation of how Griffith's sorcerous manipulation of the US took such easy hold:"Oh, I disagree," Chef {the Hellfighter} retorts. "White folk earn something from that hate. Might not be wages. But knowing we on the bottom and they set above us—just as good, maybe better.Still works today. 45's vile "basket of deplorables" full up on that kind of scumbag. Hating people is as old as humanity, and the ones that're least like your sacred itty self are the easiest to get in the habit of downin' on. (I'm sure not innocent of this: I hate the Deplorables with a cold, contemptuous superiority. "Me? Like that no-class lowbrow hillbilly? I don't think so, and fuck you for thinking it.")And then there's the delight, once you've figured out the Klans are people and the Ku Kluxes are actual, terrible monsters, of trying to get your head around why that should be, how that came about in our horrible-but-not-supernaturally-haunted time/space nexus. Author Clark got you covered:"Thought you was a godless atheist{," Sadie smirked.}"I am. But who's to say our universe is alone? Maybe there's others stacked beside us like sheets of paper. And those Ku Kluxes crossed over from somewhere else.""They was conjured," Chef reminds."'Conjuring' is just a way to open a door. Explains why their anatomy is so different, and the extreme reactions to our elements.""Why they like drinking water so," Sadie adds.She right on that. Can tell a Ku Klux straight away by all the water they drink. Colored folk who lived through the first Klans say they'd empty whole buckets, claiming they was the ghosts of soldiers from Shiloh. More water, they'd demand. Just come from hell, and plenty dry.Can't be clearer than that...this isn't quite your (great-)grandmother's 1922. And yet has all the problems...none of the help.Our story winds through Nana Jean, an old Gullah root woman, who sets up a team to fight the Ku Kluxes. She, and our narrator Maryse, are guided by three spirit-world women analogous to the Norns and other Triune Goddesses whose purpose is to maintain balance in their worlds. Maryse, Chef, and Sadie, all uniquely damaged and so able to access their existential rage, are the action arm of Nana Jean's ring-shout circle. Now, this is deep and old stuff, and there is not one single chance any of y'all reading this review have got the background in Vodoun, hoodoo, and all the other African and African-inflected spiritual practices to get every reference. I could link every third word in here, and that's just to the few little references I got. But don't feel too left out, twenty-first centurians, Author Clark uses a lot of literary references, too. Sethe, for example: a scientific type, aiding the group's scientist Molly, and proficient with a weapon. Honoring, I suppose I should say, Toni Morrison's immortal mother who loved her child so hard she made a haint of her. And haints there are in this story, plenty of them, their many, many songs of fear and betrayal and suffering powering Maryse's unique weapon of cleansing and destruction of evil and wrongness.I have deliberately not reproduced Nana Jean's Gullah dialect. I consider it disrespectful for me to do so. You'll know when you see it whether you agree with me or not.You're thinking that all this is going somewhere, but where...well, several places including through a forest of bottle trees, to an Angel Oak, into a place where there are Night Doctors of the *most*horrifying*sort* and whose lust for humanity's pain is unquenchable, and finally to a screening of The Birth of a Nation that is beyond your or my ability to conjure. It is a beautiful thing to be frightened by the capacity of people to hate. This book is a prayer to whatever force(s) rule the Simulation to open up our eyes.There's a reason the last words spoken in the story are, "'Bout damn time!"

[librolindsay · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was more of a case of "it's not you, it's me." I love the concept and the symbolism and especially Channie Waites reading on the audio (I am not sure I've heard anyone else sound like they were having so much fun), and I've loved all the interviews with Clark and the discussions digging into this novella... I just have such a hard time with cosmic horror. The threat of it is too abstract for me to feel real fear, which is a shame here because the Jim Crow South is horror enough, and when cosmic beasties start popping up, I just feel pushed out of the game altogether. Ah well.

[tornadox-962417 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Set in 1920s Macon, Georgia, it is the tale of a group of young Black women who can see monsters. They mainly fight the Ku Kluxes, who are Klanspeople corrupted by their hatred.

It's a moving tale of fighting white supremacists interspersed with bits of ethnomusicology.

[bookczuk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Pandemic read. Wow. Masterful. This was a pretty amazing book to read. Loved so much about it, including its Auntie Editor.

[ladycato · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this as part of my Nebula novella finalist packet.There's a reason why Ring Shout garnered considerable buzz upon its relief, and a Nebula nomination: it's a solid historical fantasy-tinged-with-horror novella set in a 1922 where the KKK is host to genuine hellish monsters. The voice is spot-on perfect, the characters easy to care for--and to hate.

[shrike58 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm giving this story a fairly high score but I have to admit that I didn't come away from it thinking that I had read the best novella of the year, in as much as I expect it to make the Hugo short list; it's already on the Nebula short list. So, what's my issue? At the end of the day the events of January 6 2021 may have just stolen Clark's thunder for me and, maybe, I think this whole scenario would have worked better as a novelette. We'll see: I expect to be revisiting my thoughts when the Hugo reader's package goes out.

[librarianryan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is one of those times when I think “what did I just read”? Or in my case “what did I just listen to”. I started this audiobook at least 3 different times because I kept getting lost. But notice, I never gave up because it’s so weird you just have to see what is going to happen next. I loved it. It was such a different look at race, fantasy, magical realism, etc. And it leaves itself open for a sequel. I think this book would make for great discussion in a university class. Heck even in bookclub, but most of the book clubs I know probably wouldn’t read it, or would lose interest before chapter 5 because of confusion. I once had a young boy say to me after reading The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” “I loved it. I don’t get it, but I loved it.” At the time I thought that was an odd statement, but this is the second time in my life, I have found a book for which I have to say the same thing. I think before the sequel comes out I would pick up the print book. I'm not the greatest at audiobooks, but I can say I loved it. I don’t get all of it, but I loved it. #ReadHarder - intimidated to read#musicchallenge - david bowie space oddity#Popsugar - on a BLM booklist

[breic-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not my preferred genre at all. The writing was only so-so. But, a fun conceit and good attitude.

[readingover50 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Set in 1922, the KKK is being led by monsters from another dimension. Only certain people can see their true form. Maryse can see them and with the help of a magic sword she can fight them. This book offers a unique look at a period in history. Part fantasy and part horror, the further the story progresses the more fantastical it becomes. The last half of the book is great. An epic battle between good and evil.This is a hard one for me to rate. I felt the book vilifies White people. All the White people are bad and all the Black people are good. A bit overly simplistic, but if you look at this as an allegory it makes more sense. This book is at it’s best when Maryse is battling the demons. I received a free copy from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

[grandpahobo_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

An amazingly vivid story. The author captures the essence of the racist foundation of the U.S. in a small snippet of our history. The best part is that the roles of good and evil are assigned correctly, for a change!

[khimaera · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Macon, Georgia - July 4, 1922The Ku Klux Klan are out on Main Street without their white hoods proudly celebrating with a patriotic parade. Hatred is spreading across the country like a plague, particularly since the 1915 premiere of Birth of a Nation that showed the Klan as heroes and Black people as monsters. Just the year before, Tulsa was lost in a coordinated attack. Something is trying to break into our world where it can rend and rip and feast. It feeds with joyful relish the morsels of hatred until they are fat with poisonous corruption. Conveniently, right down at the local butcher shop there is a cornucopia of “Wholesome Food for the Moral White Family”. Rich pieces of freshly carved meat still practically crawling on the plate can be shoveled right into eager, gluttonous mouths. Hatred is taught, encouraged, and nourished for not a single soul is ever born to it. It is a conscious choice. Butcher Clyde and the Ku Klux monsters will happily oblige.Enter Maryse Boudreaux and her found family of capable, colorful allies including the delightful Sadie Watkins, Chef, Nana Jean, Uncle Will, Molly, Sarah and the other folks who can see beneath the masks. The human Klan don’t need to wear them any longer, but the Ku Kluxes do. They still need to wear human skin to walk among us until the day they too can walk openly with righteous cause in the world they have carved out of ours. Once they slough off their human skin, the monsters beneath come out to play and they’re not so easy to kill. It's a good thing Maryse has a mystical sword she can call upon to aid her in battle, even if she doesn't fully understand it yet. Fortunately, she has a trio of dubious, meddlesome Aunties who provide her with some advice as she faces off against powerful forces determined to see her fall. Perhaps, the Aunties offer, there may be another ally to thwart Butcher Clyde’s grand designs: The Night Doctors. Just find the dead Angel Oak tree decked out in rattling bones and cut your way through the flesh of the bark and step through… like stepping through the portal to the home of the Cenobites. The price? Cutting through Maryse’s haunted past with surgical precision to the most tender of places where her pain and anger and hatred were born so she can find the strength to fight for the future.The finale at Stone Mountain is pure cinematic wonder with a few surprises yet to be unveiled. Beneath a “hollerin’ Baptist downpour”, the Birth of the Nation is being shown to hundreds of assembled Klan and Ku Kluxes. In front of the screen, a gallows platform for six and Butcher Clyde before a towering burning cross proselytizing his hatred to willing supplicants. The Grand Cyclops is on its way. Ring Shout is at turns humorous, touching, and filled with ordinary human moments between scenes of threat and horror. As for the eponymous ring shouts that start each section of the novella, I’ll leave that to the reader to savor. Just don’t call it a dance. Underlying it all, a question: Where does hatred come from? It is also a precious and timely reminder that the real monsters are the ones that lie and look like the truth.

[krau0098 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book that I borrowed from the library.Story (5/5): I absolutely loved this story. This takes place in 1915, as the Klan’s ranks swell and spread fear and violence across the US. However, unknown to most of the public the Klan is being led by demons called Ku Kluxes. The Ku Kluxes have an even bigger plan for evil domination of the whole world and it is up to Maryse and her resistance fighters to stop it. This was an amazing concept that tackles a lot of social issues while also being incredibly entertaining and well done. While it is your basic monster slaying fantasy, the way it is done is just beautiful. I loved the story and how seamlessly it was woven into the history of the time.Characters (5/5): I am quickly coming to realize that Clark makes amazing characters and this book was no exception to that rule. Maryse was amazing and kind of the planner of the group, as well as an excellent swordswoman. Sadie is a sharpshooter with one heck of a mouth on her. Cordelia is an ex-soldier (yes she lied to get into the army) and is their explosions expert. These women are amazing and incredibly fun to read about; they are tough and complex and I adored them.Setting (5/5): The whole book takes place in Macon, Georgia right in the middle of the Ku Klux Klan’s peak. It was really well done and I was super impressed by how seamlessly Clark merged these demons and this sort of Lovecraftian mentality into this era. It was just perfect.Writing Style (5/5): The more of Clark’s books I read the more impressed I am. This is the third book I have read by him and I’ve loved them all. Clark has a knack for building awesome worlds in a short page space, creating characters you can’t help but love and admire, making a fast paced complex and entertaining story, and doing all of this over a backdrop of thoughtful political and social issues. His books entertain the heck out of me, are super fun to read, but also leave me thoughtful and thinking about important topics….in short, they are spectacular.My Summary (5/5): Overall I loved this book soooo much. At its heart it's a wild monster hunting fantasy ride, but it’s also so much more. There’s an amazing world, engaging characters, heart-stopping action, and a fascinating story to boot. Then on top of all that the story leaves you thinking long after you finish it. I am going to say if you are at all interested in historical fantasies I would check out all of Clark’s books. In fact maybe everyone should just check out Clark’s books, they are so much darn fun to read!

[spaceandsorcery · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ring Shout is the kind of book I jokingly call “a Tardis-like story”, one that is much bigger on the inside than it looks on the outside: it’s a well-crafted mix of historical fiction and horror that kept me compulsively turning the pages, and what’s more prompted me to search for its many references to facts or details I knew nothing about, so that I ended up with a little more knowledge than I possessed before I started reading, which is always a definite plus for me.The story is set in Georgia, in 1922: never-vanquished racism is experiencing a resurgence thanks to the 1915 first showing of D.W. Griffith’s movie The Birth of a Nation, which offered a sort of heroic aura to members of the Ku Klux Klan, whose heinous actions are here made worse by the appearance of monstrous, extra-dimensional creatures called Klu Kluxes - essentially supernatural beasts able to wear human form. Griffith himself is portrayed as an evil sorcerer using his movie to propagate hateful, racist ideas to a wider public: while the very real writings of white suprematist Thomas Dixon reached a wide public, it was not considered wide enough, so that it was understood that a more capillary means of propagation was needed, hence the movie:""[…] books could only reach so many. That’s when D.W. Griffith took ahold of it. […] Dixon and Griffith had made a conjuring that reached more people than any book would.""Against this encroaching tide of evil, three very badass young women battle daily to keep the beasts as contained as possible: Maryse is a sort of “chosen one” heroine, able to summon a magical sword animated by the spirits of those who sold their people into slavery; Sadie is an exceptional, fearless sniper, wielding her Winchester rifle, affectionately called Winnie, with gleeful skill; and Cordelia (nicknamed Chef for her ability to cook devastating explosives) is a veteran of WWI dealing with post-war trauma. As the three engage the Ku Kluxes through guerrilla sorties - selling bootleg liquor in their free time - a new menace appears on the horizon through the ominous figure of Butcher Clyde, who rallies both Klansmen and Ku Kluxes for what might be a devastating engagement that threatens to unleash a new, pervasive form of destruction, touching both body and spirit.As I said, I learned many new interesting facts by following the historical leads contained in this novella: even though I was aware of the existence of Griffith’s movie, I ignored both the story it portrayed and its not-so-subtle racism, just as I heard for the first time the term Ring Shout, which depicts a traditional dance brought from Africa by its enslaved people and offering strength from mixing Christian themes with reverence for one’s ancestors and the wisdom their example can offer. And another first is represented by the mention of Night Doctors, mythical figures used as a scaremongering technique by slave owners to prevent their laborers from running away.These fascinating real-world details mix quite seamlessly with the breathless pace of the story and its horrific elements, whose Lovecraftian quality seemed to me a sort of tongue-in-cheek poke at racism, given that Lovecraft was well-known for his views on the subject, so that the presence of Cthulhu-like monsters wearing the guise of human beings can speak volumes on the effect that mindless hate and prejudice can have on people. Not to mention the further message that evil need not necessarily wear the face of a slavering monster from Hell, because it can be strengthened just as easily by witnessing injustice and choosing to do nothing about it, or worse, allowing it to prosper by supporting it wholeheartedly.Even though set in the recent past, Ring Shout brings home in no uncertain terms the awareness that the issues of that past are still present today, unchanged and unchangeable: I like the way the author avoided the use of a preaching tone, but rather blended the more horrifying aspects of the story with some unabashed, witty banter that gifted the narrative with an easily flowing current but was nevertheless able to carry the message home quite clearly. Still, this apparent lightness never shifts attention from important themes, or the realization that now, like back then, humankind is divided by chasms that seem to get deeper with every passing day, that mindless hatred and anger are turning people into virtual monsters, driving them to forget their very humanity in the name of the oh-so-very dangerous mentality of “us and them”. The concept of the movie as a recruiting force (for want of a better word), as the images on screen bring the spectators’ worst instincts the surface, is one that I found profoundly disturbing: just as people at the start of the 20th Century felt legitimized in publicly supporting racism by seeing it portrayed in a widely popular movie, now, a hundred years later, their “inheritors” feel the same way because figures invested with authority give them the unspoken permission to be openly and proudly as racist as their ancestors. Hate of the other has long been a way of mitigating one’s perceived inadequacies, as one of the characters underlines so well:""White folk earn something from that hate. Might not be wages, but knowing we on the bottom and they set above us – just as good, maybe better.""reminding us that such feelings can be a powerfully dangerous tool when wielded by the wrong person…Despite its short number of pages, Ring Shout is a deep, and deeply engrossing story, a way to explore both factual history and the recesses of the human soul - and above all a thought-provoking book that we should not miss at any cost.

[katehonig · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of the best books I’ve read this year. It’s like a combination of Lovecraft Country and The City We Became set in the Macon of the 1920s. This author does an amazing job of setting the scene and creating the characters so quickly you are invested from the first page.

[montzaleew · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ring Shoutby P. Djèlí ClarkAt first I didn't want to read this book even though everyone was talking about it. I thought it was about the KKK and their evil. I just couldn't stomach anymore racism in this world of trumpism. But I had read a book by this author before and so I thought I would give it a try and if I didn't like it, well, the next person in line at the library will be happy!Within minutes I was excited! Sharp shooter shooting Klu Kluxes! Not those Ku Klux, lol! Now this was my kind of story! The evil of the KKK turns those people into Ku Kluxes, monsters! Real monsters hiding in people suits, unseen unless you have the sight! The movie Birth of a Nation has a spell that works on the evil in people.This story is mostly based around three people fighting for the people, protecting them. One has a magical sword. Very exciting and unique! Now this is a KKK book I like to read! Monsters! They are monsters before they change in my opinion! Terrific concept and storyline! Loved it!

[quondame · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Full of dark arresting imagery this battle against forces of darkness required me to read it in several sessions, short though it is, as it was intense enough to require time to regain the resources of nerve to continue. Also, to avoid my mind pulling up similar scenes from an array of fantasy and horror novels and falling into them. I felt I had to keep combing from my mind bits of American Gods and Wheel of Time and others. But that maybe just me.