{"product_id":"the-rib-king-9781799947677","title":"The Rib King","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"Ladee Hubbard's voice is a welcome original.\" --Mary Gaitskill\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUpstairs, Downstairs meets Parasite: The acclaimed author of The Talented Ribkins deconstructs painful African American stereotypes and offers a fresh and searing critique on race, class, privilege, ambition, exploitation, and the seeds of rage in America in this intricately woven and masterfully executed historical novel, set in the late nineteenth-century Chicago that centers around the black servants of a down-on-its heels upper-class white family.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor fifteen years August Sitwell has worked for the Barclays, a well-to-do white family who plucked him from an orphan asylum and gave him a job. The groundskeeper is part of the household's all-black staff, along with \"Miss Mamie,\" the talented cook, pretty new maid Jennie Williams, and three young kitchen apprentices--the latest orphan boys Mr. Barclay has taken in to civilize; boys like August.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut the Barclays fortunes have fallen, and their money is almost gone. When a prospective business associate proposes selling Miss Mamie's delicious rib sauce to local markets under the brand name \"The Rib King\"--using a caricature of a wildly grinning August wearing a chef's hat and jewel-encrusted crown on the label--Mr. Barclay, desperate for cash, agrees. Yet neither Miss Mamie nor August will see a dime. Humiliated but bound to a ten-year contract he cannot break, August grows increasingly distraught, his anger building to a rage that explodes in shocking tragedy. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eElegantly written and exhaustively researched, The Rib King is an unsparing examination of America's fascination with black iconography and exploitation that redefines African American stereotypes in literature. In this powerful, disturbing, and timely novel, Ladee Hubbard reveals who people actually are, and most importantly, who and what they are not.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e CD\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Ojo, Adenrele\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 01\/19\/2021\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e HarperCollins\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781799947677","brand":"Adenrele Ojo","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":32963021963339,"sku":"9781799947677","price":39.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0021\/1697\/6715\/products\/img_72cb5e5b-e615-43e4-9727-f3d9e76ff5db.jpg?v=1605743921","url":"https:\/\/blackbookstore.com\/products\/the-rib-king-9781799947677","provider":"Black Bookstore","version":"1.0","type":"link"}