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Chain-Gang All-Stars

By: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Narrated by: Shayna Small, Michael Crouch, Lee Osorio, Aaron Goodson
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Publisher's Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

Enter a world where, watched by millions, prisoners fight like gladiators for the ultimate prize: their freedom. Perfect for fans of The Handmaid's Tale, Squid Game and Watchmen

**A MOST ANTICIPATED TITLE OF 2023 from The Independent, Elle, The Millions, Salon, Washington Post, Seattle Times, Huffington Post, Oprah Daily, The Week, Book Riot, Lit-Reactor, Goodreads, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus AND MANY MORE**

Welcome to Chain-Gang All-Stars, the popular and highly controversial programme inside America's prison system. In packed arenas, watched by millions of live-stream viewers, prisoners compete as gladiators for the ultimate prize: their freedom.

Fan favourites Loretta Thurwar and Hamara 'Hurricane Staxxx' Stacker are teammates and lovers. Thurwar is nearing the end of her time on the circuit, free in just a few matches, a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer. As she prepares for her final encounters, as protestors gather at the gates, and as the programme's corporate owners stack the odds against her - will the price be simply too high?

*Roxane Gay's May Selection for the Audacious Book Club*
©2023 Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (P)2023 Penguin Audio
Political Historical Fiction World Literature Dystopian
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Critic Reviews

Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is one of the most exciting young writers in America. His work is urgent, engaging, wildly entertaining, formally bold and politically electrifying. Read one page, any page, and you'll see what I mean. (George Saunders, author of LINCOLN IN THE BARDO)
A defiant, awe-inspiring novel that will be read, studied and celebrated for generations, Chain-Gang All-Stars leads with love. Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah writes with stunning compassion and moral clarity as he interrogates every facet of our carceral world and the American spectacle of violence, never losing sight of the human cost of systemic injustice. Readers will be forever changed by this book. (Jessamine Chan, author of THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD MOTHERS)
Makes explicit how the spirit erodes as the body becomes currency. Adjei-Brenyah writes sharply about the economy of spectacle and the fickle alchemy between futility and hope. (Raven Leilani, author of LUSTER)

What listeners say about Chain-Gang All-Stars

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Everyone should read this!

This is without a doubt the best book I’ve read this year!
The descriptions of a not too distant American prison system felt so real, so alive.
Read it! Read it!
The performances are so good, best audiobook I’ve listened to
The stories are filled with nuance and compassion,
Loved every minute of it

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The story with the factual asides

Really really great book. To balance the satire whilst having a really interesting and engaging story takes skill and Nana nails it here. The little segments of real life facts sprinkled through the book are done very well, where a lesser writer would struggle with integrating facts like this, Nana does it seamlessly. Very thought provoking book with real life connotations (scarily so). Manages to humanise the people that we as a society in the current world and system actively de-humanise, but without shying away from the actions that landed them in prison in the first place.
Very well done and a must read for anyone that can stomach some violence.

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Expected a kind of hunger games - got so much more

This was such a beautiful and addictive book. The characters were wonderfully developed and the narrators performed them with such elegance, it may be my favourite audio book performance yet. Even more, chain gang spoke to the spectrum of human experience, holding dialectic perspectives with compassion and nuance.

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Superb story, disturbingly possible

An engaging account of a very possible future, driven by a superb narrative from multiple characters perspectives

Footnotes about current correctional and civic mistreatment make the authors potential future seem even more possible

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voices were great!

really enjoyed this one.
think hunger games x blm
dystopia, like our world but little bit diff'rent

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Brilliant book, from start to end

An entertaining story well told by a first-class cast. Highly recommend reading now before it no doubt becomes a film in coming years.

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