4.0
Sky Full of Elephants
ByPublisher Description
“Bold and imaginative.” —Tananarive Due
“This stunning allegory will spark much discussion.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A truly powerful and riveting story.” —Booklist
In a world without white people, what does it mean to be Black?
One day, a cataclysmic event occurs: all of the white people in America walk into the nearest body of water. A year later, Charlie Brunton is a Black man living in an entirely new world. Having served time in prison for a wrongful conviction, he’s now a professor of electric and solar power systems at Howard University when he receives a call from someone he wasn’t even sure existed: his daughter Sidney, a nineteen-year-old left behind by her white mother and step-family.
Traumatized by the event, and terrified of the outside world, Sidney has spent a year in isolation in Wisconsin. Desperate for help, she turns to the father she never met, a man she has always resented. Sidney and Charlie meet for the first time as they embark on a journey across a truly “post-racial” America in search for answers. But neither of them are prepared for this new world and how they see themselves in it.
Heading south toward what is now called the Kingdom of Alabama, everything Charlie and Sidney thought they knew about themselves, and the world, will be turned upside down. Brimming with heart and humor, Cebo Campbell’s astonishing debut novel is about the power of community and connection, about healing and self-actualization, and a reckoning with what it means to be Black in America, in both their world and ours.
“This stunning allegory will spark much discussion.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A truly powerful and riveting story.” —Booklist
In a world without white people, what does it mean to be Black?
One day, a cataclysmic event occurs: all of the white people in America walk into the nearest body of water. A year later, Charlie Brunton is a Black man living in an entirely new world. Having served time in prison for a wrongful conviction, he’s now a professor of electric and solar power systems at Howard University when he receives a call from someone he wasn’t even sure existed: his daughter Sidney, a nineteen-year-old left behind by her white mother and step-family.
Traumatized by the event, and terrified of the outside world, Sidney has spent a year in isolation in Wisconsin. Desperate for help, she turns to the father she never met, a man she has always resented. Sidney and Charlie meet for the first time as they embark on a journey across a truly “post-racial” America in search for answers. But neither of them are prepared for this new world and how they see themselves in it.
Heading south toward what is now called the Kingdom of Alabama, everything Charlie and Sidney thought they knew about themselves, and the world, will be turned upside down. Brimming with heart and humor, Cebo Campbell’s astonishing debut novel is about the power of community and connection, about healing and self-actualization, and a reckoning with what it means to be Black in America, in both their world and ours.
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities202 Reviews
4.0
Luke
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Fatoş
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Dominique
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“The female main character was very irritating but it fit the story and she comes around somewhat in the end. I just want to know WHAT HAPPENS? and not necessarily in another book. I wouldn’t be able to take more of the FMC lol”Sheri-Marie
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“In a world where all the white people mysteriously drown themselves, everyone else has to figure out how to live & shape a future. Centers Charlie & Sydney, his half white daughter, & their journey south to find where there might still be whiteness, but finding the enormity of the power of Diasporic Black consciousness on the way. Unsettled by how it positions Haiti as a source of the old ways that can shape a future, but ultimately taken by its vision of the potency of emotion for regeneration.”Carl
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“A supremely beautiful novel about identity, family, kinship, and ancestry. Thought-provoking and reflective, this is a unique story that touches on so many parts of humanity and morality. The writing is so poetic, it made me wish I was reading a copy of my own instead of a library copy so I could underline things. Honestly, I would really love to read a sequel in the future that explores what happens next, but I also think the ending is perfect as-is.”About Cebo Campbell
Cebo Campbell is an author and creative director based in Brooklyn, New York. Winner of the Linda L. Ross Creative Writing Award and the Stories Award for Poetry, Cebo’s work has been featured in numerous publications. Cebo is the cofounder of the award-winning creative agency, Spherical, where he leads a team of creatives in shaping the best hotel brands in the world. Sky Full of Elephants is his debut novel.
Other books by Cebo Campbell
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