Milwaukee Blues

Echoing the murders of Eric Garner and George Floyd, this heartfelt, fluidly told account by Haitian novelist Dalembert (The Mediterranean Wall) portrays one young Black man and his fatal encounter with the police. Emmett grows up in the rough Franklin Heights neighborhood of Milwaukee, a gentle, charismatic boy with a talent for football whose story is unfolded through accounts by the people around him. Starting with the Pakistani shopkeeper now recriminating himself for having called 911 on Emmett, they include an idealistic white teacher at his grammar school; childhood friends in Franklin Heights; the Black coach at the predominantly white, Catholic university where Emmett won an athletic scholarship; Emmett’s white fiancée, distraught when he ends their relationship as unworkable in a hostile world; and the woman he became involved with when he returned home, his NFL dreams destroyed by injury. An extended third-person account of Emmett’s funeral and an accompanying demonstration point hopefully to the dream of equality for all. What results is the poignant portrait not just of one Black man destroyed by racist violence but of an entire community struggling with its burdens.