A review by starrysteph
Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

adventurous challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Chain-Gang All-Stars is an intoxicating dystopian piece that offers a bone-chilling response to incarceration, systemic racism, and so much more - but through the eyes and voices of characters that continue to love and fight back against their dehumanization.

Gladiator-style death matches between prisoners have reshaped sports entertainment and made CAPE (Criminal Action Penal Entertainment) immensely successful. People across the country tune in to watch the stars of Chain-Gang All-Stars, rooting for their favorite fighters and witnessing every moment of their lives. Of course there’s some protesting of the brutal games - especially from the abolitionist crowd - but mostly, the money keeps coming.

Loretta Thurwar and Hamar “Hurricane Staxx” Stacker are two of the biggest stars of the BattleGround, with Thurwar only a handful of fights away from freedom. As Thurwar thinks of her legacy and tries to protect her fellow Links, the GameMasters prepare to milk Thurwar’s popularity until the last moment and create an unforgettable season. We travel from the prisons to the games to corporate boardrooms to protest planning and beyond, getting an unflinching look at a world that doesn’t seem terribly different from our own.

It’s a story that is darkly clever and not at all subtle - and Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s footnotes hammer everything home, with references to current prison statistics and real people & cases. There’s a lot of commentary here. It is mostly centered around the American prison system and how it intertwines with systemic racism and capitalism, but there is also criticism of entertainment and sports media - and the abuse of Black bodies in those spaces.

The web of POVs was brilliantly executed. The worldbuilding was both captivating and devastatingly believable.  Some chapters felt like their own short stories, and each mini arc outside of the main narratives added more color and more horror to this world. We see civilians who get wrapped up in the reality tv show aspect of the games, and people with a platform terrified to speak up, and doctors watching their discoveries and inventions get warped beyond imagination.

This is a world with fancy tech and elevated forms of punishment. But we still look at the simple yet  incomprehensible torture that is solitary confinement and how that could lead someone to choose a death match over continuing to live in prison. 

This is a gory, violent book. But I don’t want to neglect the shining moments of compassion. These characters loved each other fiercely. They hang on to their humanity and force the world to see it. There are conversations with abolitionists who believe that a better future is possible, even if they don’t have all the answers yet.

CW: death, murder, psychological & physical torture, police brutality, violence, gore, incarceration & confinement, racism, homophobia, trauma, self harm, suicide, slavery, grief, sexual violence

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(I received a free copy of this book; this is my honest review.)