P. Djèlí Clark is no stranger to the novella, and Ring Shout, a demonic horror twist on the Jim Crow South, is the newest addition to his collection. In Ring Shout, Clark gives us a world where the release of The Birth of a Nation in 1915 was a ritual performed by white men to summon demons — and not just any demons. Ku Kluxes are pale, pointy-headed entities existing alongside human members of the Klan, terrorizing Black folk and intentionally feeding the Klan's racist hatred ... Clark's craft and thoughtfulness are best seen in his use of history. Ring Shout navigates the thorny waters of using real events, as we've recently seen in TV shows like Watchmen and Lovecraft Country ... I finished my first reading of Ring Shout easily, in a single sitting; once the story picks up, it keeps hitting hard, climbing — no soaring — to a cinematic finish, with character beats that hit beautifully.
Tananarive Due, in her essay 'Black Horror Rising,' discusses the role of racial trauma in horror fiction, writing that 'horror can help us allegorize racial monsters to help us to confront true-life fears.' ... One Black writer using the horror genre to its full potential is the award-winning P. Djèlí Clark, whose new novella, Ring Shout is a fantastical, brutal and thrilling triumph of the imagination ... Clark’s combination of historical and political reimagining is cathartic, exhilarating and fresh, casting a narrative spell as enchanting as HBO’s adaptation of Watchmen. It is the kind of reimagining of history that puts the act of storytelling, and the art of the horror genre, at the forefront of literary and political life.
P. Djèlí Clark is well known in the world of speculative fiction for his unique ability to seamlessly take key pieces of history and morph them into the fantastical ... Clark is back in October 2020 with a new release likely to be just as successful with fans and critics alike: Ring Shout ... The foundational concept of Ring Shout is ingenious — Clark turns the monstrous humans who were members of the Ku Klux Klan into actual monsters that must be destroyed. However, there are also many other historical counterpoints which Clark creatively twists and moulds into his unique fantasy world of prohibition-era Georgia ... Simply put, Ring Shout is a brilliant piece of speculative fiction. In just the length of a single novella, Clark presents a history lesson, copious amounts of action and adventure, social commentary that is critically important in the United States today, and all the elements of fantasy one could desire ... There are so many more layers readers need to unfurl for themselves as this cleverly crafted, vastly moving novella builds in intensity until the very end. So, I will simply leave you with this … go grab a copy of Ring Shout!
Ring Shout, the latest historical fantasy novella by the ever-brilliant P. Djèlí Clark, achieves what the TV show Lovecraft Country couldn’t manage: to do something entirely new with H.P. Lovecraft. Twisting and twining racial violence with supernatural horror is old hat, but Clark has never been an author to settle for what’s expected ... Choosing to parallel Klan rallies with ring shouts is genius-level work on Clark’s part ... Each book from P. Djèlí Clark is better than the last. And that’s saying something when they are all absolutely fantastic. Ring Shout is exactly what I wanted from Clark doing cosmic horror in a historical fantasy setting. It is simultaneously unrelenting, eviscerating, and unflinching. There is no one quite like P. Djèlí Clark and no story like Ring Shout. Get this book in your hands immediately.
If there’s such a thing as boisterous folk horror, P. Djèlí Clark’s Ring Shout may set the standard ... There’s always a balancing act when an author chooses to invoke a system of supernatural horror in the context of lived horrors such as the Klan or systemic racism; readers might reasonably ask if one is in danger of overshadowing or diluting the other ... lark rather ingeniously introduces a second system of supernatural power to counter the evils of Butcher Clyde and the Klan, and grounds it fully in the folklore of haints and Gullah magic, most clearly embodied in Maryse’s 'aunties.' Thus, Maryse’s magic sword in the astral world parallels Sadie’s rifle in the streets of Macon, where street-level Klan members come across largely as clueless dupes to be manipulated by Clyde and his associates. Still, Clark does a brilliant job of grounding his spectacle in a convincing and unnerving portrait of the 1920s South, with a few chilling instances of the real costs of racism. What may be more important is how he does this without forgoing the energetic, almost cheerfully musical celebration of the power of resistance and belief.
... flirts with allegories of hatred and corruption, just as it stirs echoes of much simpler sci-fi plotting. It’s invigorated by quotations from forgotten voices of the past, often in Gullah, recorded by scholars. One thing is sure: Ring Shout isn’t really about 1922 in Georgia. It’s looking forward to the here and now.
What if White supremacy was not only a monstrous philosophy, but was enabled by actual horrific monsters? Clark's feverishly inventive period adventure imagines this scenario in blunt and grisly detail ... Clark’s novel is at once rousing, boisterous, and clever. He channels the kitschy motifs of early-20th-century pulp horror into a narrative that both spoofs and exalts that flamboyant tradition. In the process, he cunningly and pithily weaves in African folklore, American history, and sociopolitical tropes that resonate with our present-day racial upheaval. Devotees of Lovecraft Country, Get Out, and other horror adventures with African American themes: Take note.Thrills, chills, macabre humor, and engaging heroines to root for: What more could a reader want?
