Darryl Pinckney says his new novel, Black Deutschland, exists because his parents no longer do – not because they had any disapproval of his (and the protagonist's) life as a young, gay ex-pat in Berlin, but because of his own trepidations in his role of son versus author. He talks about the attraction of leaving America to discover how to be an African-American in America and unlike other stories of struggle and Black triumph, in this one, Jeb, the main character, never quite finds his footing.
Read an excerpt from Black Deutschland.
Photo: Gregg Lewis