Books by Tananarive Due
The Reformatory: A Novel
by Tananarive Due
đ Winner of the 2023 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Novel
đ Winner of the 2023 Shirley Jackson Award
â Shortlisted for the 2024 Locus Award for Horror
â Shortlisted for the 2024 LA Times Book Award for Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Speculative Fiction
Tananarive Due's eerie novel about a haunted boys' prison in Jim Crow-era Florida was inspired by the troubled life and premature death of the author's uncle, who died at the real-life Dozier School for Boys in 1937. "I was so struck by the sadness of this institutionâs reign of terror that I knew I had to write about itâbut not as nonfiction," Due told Black Fiction Addiction. "I decided to fictionalize Robert Stephens and his experience to represent many nameless, faceless young people who suffered and lost their lives at the Dozier School. I made him 12 instead of 15 and changed the year to 1950, since I knew that era better from my motherâs stories. I also used ghosts to try to make the violence at the institution a bit more removed from my protagonist." A creepy story of survival that is, quite literally, haunting.
“It slightly defies categorisation, in the best way. Itâs a gripping read. Itâs 1950s Florida, and our protagonists â siblings â are black, their father on the run after trying to unionise and being falsely accused of rape, their mother dead. Young Robert is sent to the Reformatory, an institute for juvenile âoffendersâ (he kicked a grown man to defend his sister). Here there are haints, i.e. ghosts; premonitions are the other major fantasy element. The supernatural here is definitely on the disturbing side.” Read more...
Interviews where books by Tananarive Due were recommended
Award-Winning Fantasy Novels of 2024, recommended by Sylvia Bishop
This yearâs award-winning fantasy books offer something for every taste, from melancholic fairy tales to gripping horror. Our fantasy and sci fi editor Sylvia Bishop introduces the winning titles.
The Best Horror Novels: The 2024 Bram Stoker Awards, recommended by The Horror Writers Association
It’s not too late to discover your favourite book of the year. Here, we offer a round-up of the horror novels garlanded at the Horror Writers Association’s annual Bram Stoker Awards in 2024, which offers everything from haunted houses to slasher homages: a perfectly curated selection for those who prefer their books to scare them senseless.
