Holcomb Gets International Recognition for ‘Romance in Marseille’

Dr. Gary Edward Holcomb recently coedited The Claude McKay Harlem Renaissance novel, Romance in Marseille, which has received quite a bit of attention from national newspapers, like The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. It has also garnered favorable reviews in magazines, like The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, The New York Review of Books, and New York magazine. His work has also been featured in international newspapers and other online sites in Australia, India, Italy, Greece, Jamaica (McKay’s homeland). Holcomb was interviewed on the CBC (Canadian Broadcating Corporation) cultural arts show Q.

Holcomb was invited to give a few talks on the novel, including at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C., but the talks had to be postponed due to the pandemic.

Newspaper & magazine reviews: “The Best New Novel Was Written Ninety Years Ago,” New York (magazine); “A Legless Black Man Comes into a Windfall in This Biting Satire,” New York Times Book Review; New Yorker; Wall Street Journal; “Claude McKay abandoned ‘Romance in Marseille’ because it was too daring. He was just ahead of his time,” Washington Post.

Distinctions: “9 Books We Recommend This Week,” New York Times Book Review Bestseller section, Editor’s Choice/Staff Picks; “Great Quarantine Reads,” Vanity Fair; “The Strategist,” New York (magazine); African American Literature Book Club ranked #8 bestseller for March/April 2020; 12 Recent Queer Audiobooks that Will Fill Your Ears with Pride, Bookriot.com.

Preview feature: “A Book So Far Ahead of Its Time, It Took 87 Years to Find a Publisher,” New York Times.

3 more New York Times notices: “Penguin Classics and Other Works to Diversify Offerings from the Canon”; “When Classical Composers Did the Fox Trot”; “The Nobel-Winning Economist Who Wants You to Read More Fiction” (interview with Joseph Stiglitz).

Academic reviews: American Communist History; “The ‘Late’ Modernism of Claude McKay’s Romance in Marseille,” The Modernist Review.

Political studies journal review: Jacobin.

TV review: “Bill’s Books,” WNBC-TV Weekend Today in New York.

Online reviews: Lambdaliterary.org;Bookmarks.org “Rave”; Bomb.com; NYCaribnews; PopMatters.

Trade magazine review: Publishers Weekly.

Articles in international press: 2 articles in The Gleaner, The Observer (Jamaica), Ilpost, Rivistastudio.com, la Repubblica (Italy), Diastixo(Greece), Hindu.com (India), Perfil (Argentina), Sydney Morning Herald (Australia).

Radio: “After 90 Years, Novel by Radical Harlem Renaissance Author Finally Published,” interview on CBC Q arts and culture program; “Lost Secrets of the Harlem Renaissance” panel discussion, NPR 1A; BBC World News Service segment on Harlem Renaissance new discoveries.

Literary journal excerpt: 2 chapters in The Los Angeles Review of Books.

Book launch and panel discussion: New York University, Feb. 21, 2020.

Amazon #1 New Releases in African American Historical Fiction, Classic American Fiction, Political Fiction; Most Wished for in African American Historical Fiction, etc.

WorldCat: in 195 libraries, worldwide.