The Travelers: Regina Porter - Softcover

"An astoundingly audacious debut." (Oprah Magazine)

"American history comes to vivid, engaging life in this tale of two interconnected families (one white, one black)... the complex, beautifully drawn characters are unique and indelible." (Entertainment Weekly)

"A sprawling, ambitious debut ... Beautifully written and intricately plotted." (Kirkus)

"An absolute wonder of a novel. A sweeping examination of race and class within America's troubled history. A love letter to fearless women laced with a sharp humour. I'm thrilled by the magnitude, ingenuity and heart of Regina Porter's daring vision." (Irenosen Okojie)

"In this innovative and deeply moving debut, Regina Porter has mastered the kind of alchemy found in a great painting by Poussin: her canvas is vast, her subject ambitious, and yet her execution is so brilliantly devoted to particulars that it creates a miraculous intimacy. The beauty of this book lies in how Porter's characters, through resilience and community, art and creative love, cut new doors out of the corners they've been backed into by history." (Garth Greenwell)

An astonishing debut novel that bears witness to the Civil Rights movement, the Vietnam War and the first term of Obama's presidency, The Travelers is both an intimate family portrait and a searing examination of America today.

James Vincent is born in 1942 to a working class white couple whose marriage was already on the rocks. James struggles to move beyond a difficult childhood and escapes the violence at home to attend law school in Michigan, where he begins to envision his future as prosperous and bright.

Meanwhile, on a rural road in Georgia, Agnes Miller, a black woman on her first date with a handsome suitor, is pulled over by the police, and the terrible moments that follow make her question whether she will have a future at all. As the years unspool ahead of them, unexpected turns of fate will connect these two lives and their families: two Americans who each come up against the forces of race, class, and gender that change – and end – ordinary lives.