Perfect for fans of Nnedi Okorafor and Blake Crouch, this book melds the ethicallycomplex Afrofuturism of Black Panther with the unflinching brutality of No Country for Old Men.

ESPERANCE
by Adam Oyebanji
Quercus, TBD
(via JABberwocky Literary Agency)

Ethan Krol is a white cop in Chicago with the misfortune of landing an impossible murder case. A Black father and infant son are found dead in the living room of a 20th floor apartment, drowned, with their lungs full of sea water — 700 miles from the nearest ocean. There are no signs of struggle and the victims’ wife and mother is found unconscious, but unharmed, in the bedroom.

Ethan’s initial investigation turns up eerily similar, unsolved cases in Rhode Island and Nigeria, and puts him on the heels of a phantom who can thwart every camera in our highly-surveilled, present-day world.

In Bristol, England, Abidemi Eniola is having as much trouble adjusting to her new surroundings as they are to her. While her appearance might place her as coming from Lagos, her accent sounds more like something out of 1950’s Hollywood. To better pursue her relentless agenda Abidemi recruits Hollie Rogers, a local Bristolian, who slowly realizes that Abidemi is capable of almost anything and that there’s nothing Hollie could do to stop her.

Of Scottish and Nigerian descent, Adam Oyebanji is an escapee from Birmingham University and Harvard Law School. He currently lives in Pittsburgh, PA with a wife, child, and two embarrassingly large dogs.