Song of the Shank: A Novel
*Starred Review* Now a fairly obscure historical figure, Tom Wiggins, born a slave, became an international sensation as a pianist. In the extraordinarily talented hands of Allen, Tom is a mysterious and compelling figure, a blind black boy at a time when his perceived infirmities, including his race, should make him insignificant. Apparently an autistic savant, Tom exhibits both giftedness and odd behavior, which unnerves and enthralls those around him. Allen uses Tom as the central figure as the novel explorescomplex relationships and the interior lives of black and white folks, including a mother with little authority over her child, a fairly benign but self-absorbed slave owner, ambitious promoters, an assortment of orphans and former slaves at wit’s end about their future, and a genius oblivious to the tumult around him. Told from various perspectives, shifting between the pre– and post–Civil War periods, Allen’s tour de force sweeps from the rural South to New York City and between lonely apartments and raucous refugee camps, encompassing the strife of war and the draft riots. Amid the larger drama of slavery and its injustices, Allen offers the more intimate drama of one young boy’s life and the financial and emotional investments involved in the question of what’s to be done with his exceptional talent. A brilliant book, with echoes of Ralph Ellison and William Faulkner. --Vanessa Bush