The Last Integrationist
by Jake Lamar
(Crown 1996)
The Last Integrationist has been translated
into French as Nous avions un rêve
The Last Integrationist is a first novel of extraordinary power, a compelling story with wonderful characters that explores aspects of race relations that most Americans are afraid to discuss.
Jake Lamar sets his story in the near future -- a time close at hand. America's war against drugs and crime has resulted in harsh restrictions and public executions. The prime mover in this war is Attorney General Melvin Hutchinson, a brilliant black lawyer and staunch conservative who as a judge was dubbed "Hang 'Em High Hutch."
Reviews
"A fearless young talent to keep your eye on."
--Entertainment Weekly
"An epic tale about America and its hideously disfigured notions on race. Set in the near future and peopled by a vast yet intimately drawn cast of characters, The Last Integrationist is by turns boldly inventive, darkly prophetic, wildly funny, and, in the end, deeply moving -- a meditation on the human heart's struggle to overcome the forces that would divide us. Like Dr. Strangelove, it feels visionary, and lingers in the mind like a haunting, unforgettable dream."
--Darcy Frey, author of The Last Shot
"The Last Integrationist hurls you into the funny and frightening Twilight Zone of reading next week's headlines today."
--Trey Ellis, author of Platitudes and Home Repairs
"A compelling, controversial political thriller, part A Clockwork Orange, part The Manchurian Candidate."
--Kirkus Reviews
"A crackling page-turner...Jake Lamar has produced a thriller of ideas.... A kind of racial 1984."
--Jacob Weisberg, Vogue Magazine
Melvin Hutchinson is on the fast track to a vice-presidential nomination, but he has a potentially explosive secret.
And then there is Emma Person, a talented photographer who is having a difficult time understanding her Jewish boyfriend's insensitivity and his mother's hatred. Emma's black friends place demands on her that she struggles against, finding herself trapped between two warring camps -- white and black -- instinctively resisting the rigid definitions of both.
Emma's story and Melvin's are told against the background of a country roiled by anger and hatred, a country that seems to have lost its soul while blacks and whites try to find a way to live together or apart.