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

Named a Best of the Year Pick by 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?

A New York Times Editor's Choice Pick!
A Nebula and Locus Award Winner!
A finalist for the Hugo Award, World Fantasy Award, Ignyte Award, Goodreads Choice Award, Shirley Jackson Award, AAMBC Literary Award, British Fantasy Award, Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award, and the SIBA Award.

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 spent the formative years of his life in the homeland of his parents, Trinidad and Tobago. He is the author of the novellas The Black God's Drums, winner of a 2019 Alex Award from the American Library Association; The Haunting of Tram Car 015; and A Dead Djinn in Cairo. His short story 'The Secret Lives of the Nine Negro Teeth of George Washington' has earned him both a Nebula and Locus award. He is loosely associated with the quarterly FIYAH: A Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction and an infrequent reviewer at Strange Horizons. He currently resides in New England and ruminates on issues of diversity in speculative fiction. He is the winner of the Nebula and Locus awards.

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

Reviews for Ring Shout

[michelle.armstead401 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I loved the story of these women and their community. The story was very well told.

[George Mitu · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Am citit o pentru a retrai atmosfera din filmul Sinners si s-a potrivit perfect.

[Adriana Carolina · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Amazing! What an amazing book, from the characters to the story.

[Always In-Stock · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

His was so good it’s not even funny. Fast, action-packed, gory, and terrifying

[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.

[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.

[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.

[caedocyon · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The theme of fighting semisecret battles to protect your community against a nebulous enemy really resonated with my bleak mood lately. And the importance of being discerning about using the weapons that come to hand even when your back is against the wall.

[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.

[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.

[whitewavedarling · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This historical horror was somehow a complete surprise to me even though I've read Clark's other novels/novellas, but one thing came as no surprise: I loved it. Clark's fast-paced story-telling combined with his talent for living, breathing characters and intricate world-building came through on every page. Admittedly, I wouldn't have minded more spots slowing down so that I could live in the story with the characters a bit more, but this was a gorgeous thrill of a ride that ran at the seams with history.

I'd recommend it to any horror lover, and even to historical fiction lovers who simply want to dip into horror to see what's there.

[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.

[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.

[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.

[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!

[lynnmpk · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

***Contains Spoilers***

This book was excellent. I did have to look up some things I was unfamiliar with on Wikipedia, but I didn't mind because I love learning about different cultures. This book was the perfect size for the story being told. It was creepy. It was gory. It made me feel feels. And that ending!!! O.M.G.

I wish that just one thing was explained though-It's explicitly stated that the ku kluxes turn to ash after they die, but it's never explained how the samples they took didn't just disappear. I assume it had something to do with the glass jars that Molly gave them to put the samples in, but I would have liked if there was a line or two just clarifying it, ya know?

[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.

[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.

[veronica.sparrow · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I have been putting off doing a review as this is (hands down) one of the best books (novellas) I have read this year. I loved the characters to the point of tears at one point (no, I am not going to give spoilers) and I wish there was a way that the author could continue the story or even provide a prequel. I love the world the author created and I adored the characters in it. I will provide a review closer to publication. In the meantime... if you get a chance to read this novella.... read it!

[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.

[kitlovestea · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ring Shout is a wild ride all the way through. The characters are interesting and badass and the mysteries surrounding Maryse's backstory and sword are compelling. Its handling of racism in the time of Jim Crow and the way Djèlí seamlessly integrates that into his cosmic horror cosmology is seamless and the final confrontation is eminently satisfying.

Highly recommended for anyone looking for anyone who is into cool action sequences and sweet justice. A word of warning that it doesn't shy away from the reality of racist violence, even as it packs the plot with literal demons.

[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.

[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.

[james_knupp · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow, absolutely phenomenal. Clark has the best take on Revisitionist 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.

[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.

[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.

[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 horror

Three 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.