WHITE TEARS

Kunzru's latest offers a fascinating intermingling of the mistreatment of black Americans, immorality in the music field, and magical realism--all delivered by three talented narrators, Lincoln Hoppe, Danny Campbell, and Dominic Hoffman. Seth and Carter are representative of the self-serving personal agendas of the millennial generation. They pair set up a recording studio, and, after recording a black street musician singing the blues, they release it on the Internet as an "original find." A series of mysteriously surreal events lead to Seth's becoming permanently injured. Far more than a mystery, the story poses questions about false "facts" and the often illusory connection between white and black musical artists. Hoppe, Campbell, and Hoffman perform this engrossing, convoluted tale with all its serious implications intact. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine [Published: MARCH 2017]