The sleeping car porter / Suzette Mayr.
2022
Fiction
Available at Popular Reading
Items
Details
Author
Mayr, Suzette, author.
Title
The sleeping car porter / Suzette Mayr.
Edition
First edition.
Imprint
Toronto : Coach House Books, [2022]
Copyright
©2022
Description
219 pages : illustration ; 21 cm
Summary
"The Sleeping Car Porter brings to life an important part of Black history in North America, from the perspective of a gay man living in a culture that renders him invisible in two ways. Affecting, imaginative, and visceral enough that you'll feel the rocking of the train, The Sleeping Car Porter is a stunning accomplishment. Baxter's name isn't George. But it's 1929, and Baxter is lucky enough, as a Black man, to have a job as a sleeping car porter on a train that crisscrosses the country. So when the passengers call him George, he has to just smile and nod and act invisible. What he really wants is to go to dentistry school, but he'll have to save up a lot of nickel and dime tips to get there, so he puts up with "George." On this particular trip out west, the passengers are more unruly than usual, especially when the train is stalled for two extra days; their secrets start to leak out and blur with the sleep-deprivation hallucinations Baxter is having. When he finds a naughty postcard of two gay men, Baxter's memories and longings are reawakened; keeping it puts his job in peril, but he can't part with the postcard or his thoughts of Edwin Drew, Porter Instructor."-- Provided by publisher.
Bibliography, etc. Note
Includes bibliographical references (pages 217-219).
Historical Data
Suzette Mayr is the author of four previous novels: Monoceros, Moon Honey, The Widows, and Venous Hum. The Widows was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book in the Canada-Caribbean region, and has been translated into German. Moon Honey was shortlisted for the Writers' Guild of Alberta's Best First Book and Best Novel Awards. Monoceros was longlisted for the Giller Prize. Suzette Mayr lives and works in Calgary.
Available in Other Form
Online version: Mayr, Suzette. Sleeping car porter. Toronto : Coach House Books, 2022
Call Number
Fiction
Language
English
Awards
Winner of the Scotiabank Giller Prize, 2022
ISBN
9781552454589 (paperback)
1552454584 (paperback)
1552454584 (paperback)