Why read The Conjure-Man Dies?

Book cover of The Conjure-Man Dies: A Mystery Tale of Dark Harlem

Book description

The first known mystery written by an African-American, set in 1930s Harlem.

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Conjure-Man Dies as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Mo Moulton

Author

Rudolph Fisher was a contemporary of Sayers, but working in a very different context: the Harlem Renaissance.

This novel, reputed to be the first detective novel written by a Black American, opens with the mysterious, apparently impossible murder of a Harvard-educated fortune-teller, N’Gana Frimbo, the ‘conjure-man’ of the title. Then the body disappears, and Frimbo (apparently) reappears – throwing medical and police investigations into chaos.

There’s a surfeit of suspects and lots of talking; what I really love about this novel is the sense of being plunged into a vivid, fully-populated world. This book wins my vote for most overlooked…

From Mo's list on fans of Dorothy L. Sayers.