“A murder mystery locked inside a Great American Novel . . . Charming, smart, heart-blistering, and heart-healing.” —Danez Smith, The New York Times Book Review

Named a 2023 best book of the year by NPR/Fresh Air, Washington Post, The New Yorker, and Time Magazine, James McBride’s novel tells the story of small-town secrets and the people who keep them. In 1972, workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania digging the foundations for a new development found a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighborhood where immigrant Jews and African Americans lived side by side. As these characters’ stories overlap and deepen, it becomes clear how much the people who live on the margins struggle and what they must do to survive.