"Riot Baby bursts at the seams of story with so much fire, passion and power that in the end it turns what we call a narrative into something different altogether."--Marlon James
Rooted in foundational loss and the hope that can live in anger, Riot Baby is both a global dystopian narrative an intimate family story with quietly devastating things to say about love, fury, and the black American experience.
Ella and Kev are brother and sister, both gifted with extraordinary power. Their childhoods are defined and destroyed by structural racism and brutality. Their futures might alter the world. When Kev is incarcerated for the crime of being a young black man in America, Ella--through visits both mundane and supernatural--tries to show him the way to a revolution that could burn it all down.
Praise for Riot Baby
"Onyebuchi has woven a story as uplifting as it is heartbreaking, an epic ode to the future and past, tiny acts of resistance, love, and the wild unstoppable sweep of revolution."--Daniel Jos Older
"Tochi Onyebuchi is, primarily, a generous world-builder. His journey into this is honed and sharpened with Riot Baby, which asks a reader to care deeply for the interior of its characters, and the fights they have taken on."--Hanif Abdurraqib
"Riot Baby is the burning embers of a revolution. It's the quiet rage of generations of people who have been told they are lesser than others. It's the flash of accelerant in a genre that needs the burn."--Mark Oshiro
"Stunningly original, brutal, and electric. Onyebuchi's prose scorches. It's hard to put this book down, and when you do, it stays with you."--R. F. Kuang
"Onyebuchi's adult debut is a stunningly, vitally harrowing story and genre at its very best."--Kiersten White
"Powerful. Furious. Riot Baby carries the full weight of black American fury and grief, woven together with a masterful story of two siblings and a magic so powerful it will change the face of everything they know."--K. B. Wagers
"Onyebuchi's Riot Baby is thrilling and harrowing in the tradition of Ward's Sing, Unburied, Sing, and Dayton's Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful."--Fran Wilde
*RIFFRAFF STAFF PICK* "Thrilling sci-fi that deftly channels the anger that racial injustice past, present, and future through the lens of a pair of siblings who share an extraordinary connection." -Ethan
