I Am Not Sidney Poitier

I Am Not Sidney Poitier is an irresistible comic novel from the master storyteller Percival Everett, and an irreverent take on race, class, and identity in America

I was, in life, to be a gambler, a risk-taker, a swashbuckler, a knight. I accepted, then and there, my place in the world. I was a fighter of windmills. I was a chaser of whales. I was Not Sidney Poitier.

Not Sidney Poitier is an amiable young man in an absurd country. The sudden death of his mother orphans him at age eleven, leaving him with an unfortunate name, an uncanny resemblance to the famous actor, and, perhaps more fortunate, a staggering number of shares in the Turner Broadcasting Corporation.

Percival Everett's hilarious new novel follows Not Sidney's tumultuous life, as the social hierarchy scrambles to balance his skin color with his fabulous wealth. Maturing under the less-than watchful eye of his adopted foster father, Ted Turner, Not gets arrested in rural Georgia for driving while black, sparks a dinnertable explosion at the home of his manipulative girlfriend, and sleuths a murder case in Smut Eye, Alabama, all while navigating the recurrent communication problem: "What's your name?" a kid would ask. "Not Sidney," I would say. "Okay, then what is it?"

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Graywolf Press
Published: 05/26/2009
ISBN: 9781555975272
Pages: 234
Weight: 0.84lbs
Size: 9.02h x 6.00w x 0.70d
Award: Hurston/Wright LEGACY Award - Winner

Review Citations: Publishers Weekly 04/27/2009 pg. 110
Kirkus Reviews 06/01/2009
Multicultural Review 10/01/2009 pg. 47
London Review of Books 11/19/2009 pg. 33
Shelf Awareness 01/01/0001