The Sport of Kings - Softcover

Morgan, C. E.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0008173311 ISBN 13: 9780008173319

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 2017

Synopsis

Shortlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction
Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
Shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize
Shortlisted for the James Tait Black Fiction Prize
Winner of the Kirkus fiction prize

‘You and I are family. Blood and treasure. Listen to me, I created this world with my own two hands, and I am going to leave it all to you’

Hellsmouth, an indomitable thoroughbred filly, runs for the glory of the Forge family, one of Kentucky’s oldest and most powerful dynasties. Henry Forge has partnered with his daughter, Henrietta, in an endeavour of raw obsession: to breed the next superhorse. But when Allmon Shaughnessy, an ambitious young black man, comes to work on their farm after a stint in prison, the violence of the Forges’ history and the exigencies of appetite are brought starkly into view. Entangled by fear, prejudice, and lust, the three tether their personal dreams of glory to the speed and grace of Hellsmouth.

A spiralling tale of wealth and poverty, racism and rage, The Sport of Kings is an unflinching portrait of lives cast in shadow by the enduring legacy of slavery. A vital new voice, C. E. Morgan has given life to a tale as mythic and fraught as the South itself – a moral epic for our time.

About this title

Review:

An Amazon Best Book of May 2016: The Sport of Kings is American and epic, a novel of lineage and legacy, race horses and racism, power and poverty. It’s graceful, provocative and at the right stretches, heart-pounding. Weaving together different centuries and narratives, C.E. Morgan exposes the soft and hardened edges of humanity with crushing clarity. The Forge family is Kentucky royalty: their land and wealth has been handed down for generations and Henrietta, the daughter of Henry Forge, stands to inherit it all. With his daughter by his side, Henry sets out to breed and race the fastest horse in history. In a neighboring town, Allmon Shaughnessy, an African American boy, comes of age in a world seeped in discrimination and violence. Years later, Allmon arrives at the Forge farm determined to remake his own story. It’s there that his fate will become forever entwined with the Forge’s, as Henry, Henrietta and Allmon, each stake their future in Hellsmouth, a filly bred from champions that could win it all. Fueled by beauty and rage, lust and violence, The Sport of Kings concludes with an ending that is as adrenaline fueled as Hellsmouth’s last turn at the Kentucky Derby. C.E. Morgan’s novel is a magnificent achievement, one that grapples with the weight of the past and the near universal desire to make your own destiny. --Al Woodworth

About the Author:

C. E. Morgan lives with her husband, Will Guild, in Berea, Kentucky. She is the author of All the Living.

About this edition

• Publisher: Fourth Estate
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 0008173311
• ISBN 13: 9780008173319
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 560