An arduous race for freedom
Book of Negroes author returns with new tale of comeuppance
Lawrence Hill’s latest novel, The Illegal, is a many-headed beast — part fable, part political thriller, part character study. Both frustrating and forceful, it shares with its predecessor, The Book of Negroes, a preoccupation with an underdog character torn from their family and on a quest for survival and redemption. Set in the fictional island nations of Zantoroland and Freedom State in the Indian Ocean (and mostly in the “present” of 2018), the story follows Keita Ali, a black marathon runner in training, as he scrambles to remake himself as a refugee in a mostly white and racist nation.
Keita is an engaging character, loyal to his family, quiet and kind. When his energy flags in the middle of gruelling runs or his opponents taunt him with racist epithets, he sings corny country songs at the top of his lungs. For the first part of the book, which provides backstory, the narrator hews closely to Keita’s point of view, and the prose, like Keita himself, is matter-offact, only occasionally (and aptly) imagistic. This ex- ploration of a refugee’s trauma and sense of loss is subtle and affecting: “His heart was held aloft by only a few pillars.”
The book’s themes are urgently topical. Hill’s ironically named Freedom State is home to Africtown, where undocumented refugees rent shipping containers as homes from the town’s benevolent dictator and brothel manager Lulu DiStefano and the threat of deportation keeps them poor and powerless.
The remainder of the novel includes the points of view of the less persuasively drawn people who become Keita’s allies — and this narrative splintering diffuses some of the emotional intensity of the backstory. Yet, what these later sections lack in depth, they often make up for in intrigue and momentum. The Illegal is a page turner — and if its twists are at times predictable, they are no less compelling for it. The parallel world Hill has created allows for a perhaps fantastical overcoming of obstacles. Although political corruption and a general dearth of compassion also exist here, we understand that the right people will eventually get their comeuppance. Film rights to The Illegal have already been sold; this is a story that will appeal to a broad audience.
Still, I can’t help feeling that the book has squandered some novelistic opportunities. There is so much that fiction offers that film cannot — intimate access to a character’s sensibility, an elasticity with time, space for the reader to pause. For this reason, although I cheered at Keita’s every hard-won step toward the finish line, I also wished he weren’t racing so quickly toward it.