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X: A Novel
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X: A Novel
Unavailable
X: A Novel
Audiobook8 hours

X: A Novel

Written by Kekla Magoon

Narrated by Dion Graham

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

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Currently unavailable

Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

Winner of the 2016 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teens
A 2016 Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book

Cowritten by Malcolm X's daughter, this riveting and revealing novel follows the formative years of the man whose words and actions shook the world.

Malcolm Little's parents have always told him that he can achieve anything, but from what he can tell, that's a pack of lies-after all, his father's been murdered, his mother's been taken away, and his dreams of becoming a lawyer have gotten him laughed out of school. There's no point in trying, he figures, and lured by the nightlife of Boston and New York, he escapes into a world of fancy suits, jazz, girls, and reefer. But Malcolm's efforts to leave the past behind lead him into increasingly dangerous territory. Deep down, he knows that the freedom he's found is only an illusion-and that he can't run forever.

X follows Malcolm from his childhood to his imprisonment for theft at age twenty, when he found the faith that would lead him to forge a new path and command a voice that still resonates today.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 6, 2015
ISBN9781491502938
Unavailable
X: A Novel
Author

Kekla Magoon

Kekla Magoon is the author of many novels and nonfiction books, including The Rock and the River, How It Went Down, The Season of Styx Malone, and Revolution in Our Time: The Black Panther Party’s Promise to the People. Kekla received the 2021 Margaret A. Edwards Award for significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature. She has been a National Book Award finalist in addition to receiving an NAACP Image Award, the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, a Printz Honor, four Coretta Scott King Honors, and two Walter Award Honors. Kekla teaches writing for children and young adults at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Visit her online at keklamagoon.com.

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Reviews for X

Rating: 4.112149560747664 out of 5 stars
4/5

107 ratings22 reviews

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A fictionalized account of Malcolm X's childhood in Flint and Boston, then Harlem. Based upon his autobiography and letters and told by his daughter, this story doesn't skimp on scandal or mischief: thievery, lying, drug use, white women. Nonetheless, Malcolm is shown to be smart, and resourceful. A final robbery lands Malcolm Little in jail where he discovers The Nation of Islam and its teachings. The rest is history. For those not familiar with M X's life and legacy this stands on its own as a young black man's coming of age during the Depression and 1950s in urban America.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Not only is this a highly approachable fictional look at Malcolm X's adolescence, it is also a great immersion into 1940s Roxbury and Harlem.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The book was very well written and felt like reading a novel, not history. I, however, always have difficulty reading about Malcolm X.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Ilyasah Shabazz is the third daughter of Malcolm X; she was still a toddler when her father was assassinated but grew up in a family that remained in the front of Civil Rights activism. She grew up hearing the stories of her father's life, including the youthful adventures of a young man attempting to find himself, that eventually led him to prison and his introduction to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, with whom he began a correspondence which eventually led him to Allah, inner peace, and the courage to step forward and lead a nation towards righting wrongs which this nation is still attempting to accomplish.In Growing up X, Ms Shabazz tells us the story of Malcolm Little, a handsome, exceptionally intelligent young man who was angry, mixed up, and always trying to be "something better". The trunk of the story occurs during the 1940's telling us of his move from Illinois - away from his tight-knit family of siblings - to Boston, where he moves in with his older step-sister hoping to make a new life. Turn a leaf, stay out of trouble, make something of himself. He had not been doing well in Illinois and needed a big change. In the big city he believed he found his true self. Using information from his step-sister and friends, we are told the story of a young man who is on the edge, always looking for the next adventure. Boston to New York and back to Boston. Eventually prison (first Charlestown Prison, then Norfolk Prison Colony) where he was forced to look at himself and see others. Where he found Islam. Off of this trunk of the story, flashbacks are used to illustrate events in his life which impacted him forever. Happy warm times with his parents; going to meetings with his father and having the phrase "Up, up you mighty race" imprinted in his brain forever, his father's death, his mother struggling to keep the family together during the depression, visits from the "government people" to check on the family, his mother being taken away, and many interactions that go along with these situations.From the first few paragraphs, it was difficult to put this book down. The story it tells of a young man struggling against an unjust world is honest and unapologetic. Without being a sob story, the struggles of this young man, and his family, during the depression is described clearly. How and why decisions were made are explained as the young man experienced them - his reactions and conclusions are understandable, even if they are not the ones we (or even he) would make today.I felt sad, happy, and often thought, "Oh, my goodness, Malcolm! What are you thinking? " because this story is told on such a personal level, I feel as though I know this young man. I will recommend this book to my friends and anyone else I have a conversation about books with. Young adults should read this not only to see a bit of how Malcolm X evolved, but perhaps to see pitfalls in moving too fast through life and not taking the time to rest and look within themselves for the peach and acceptance they are looking for outside of themselves.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is an engrossing page-turner of a book depicting Malcolm X's early life. I wish I could be as eloquent in my own review of this novel. Lively and engaging, the reader comes to know Malcolm Little as a child and a young man, comes to see how the stylish young man quietly rebelled against the constraints of being black in America by moving in shady circles while trying to "become someone" the only way he knew how.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    An excellent depiction of the life of the teenage Malcolm Little, who grew up to become the African American leader known as Malcolm X. Narrated in the first person, this novel covers primarily Malcolm's life from the age of 15 to the age of 25, and depicts the people and places who influenced his life. These include his parents and siblings, foster parents, teachers, and the men and women who befriend him during his late teens and early twenties in Boston and Harlem. There are also flashbacks to Malcolm's childhood years, and flash forwards to his years in prison and ultimate conversion to and leadership of the Black Muslim movement. This novel was written by Malcolm's daughter, Ilyasah Shabazz, and is an honest and riveting tale of an important American figure. Highly recommended for junior and senior high school and public library collections.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is an excellent fictionalized biography of Malcolm X's early years, but it's also a great book on the struggles engendered by violence, poverty, racism, even just adolescence. It started slowly, despite the fact that we seemed to be in the midst of a life-and-death chase. I didn't know the characters, so it was hard to care. But right away the beauty of the language caught me. Malcolm, on the run, thinks "I want to slip the skin of this life, to be new and clean again" (5). That sentence, and many others like it, kept me reading. And the prose had to work hard for me because the next scene is one from years earlier, another pivotal moment, but, once again, I didn't know the characters or their circumstances and so didn't really care.After the first twenty or so pages, though, the book started to knit together and became, as a reviewer below says, unputdownable. The violence and poverty of Malcolm's childhood serves to strengthen family ties, so even while the children eat dandelion green soup for dinner, their mother schools them on literature and history. "We could recite passages from Shakespeare and legends about African kingdoms going back thousands of years. We could share facts about the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, the largest forced migration of a people in the history of humankind, and about the great military strategist Queen Nzingah, who defended the nation of Angola against Portug[u]ese invaders" (22).Family remains central in this book, even as the adolescent Malcolm tries to shed its responsibilities. He works at Roseland, a Boston ballroom that hosts "Negro" nights. His job gives the authors the chance to write about the amazing jazz scene of the interwar era. Swing dancing to Duke Ellington, listening to Billie Holliday sing "Strange Fruit," the reader is almost as seduced by this world as Malcolm is. And so his descent into selling reefer, shoplifting, running numbers, narrated from Malcolm's point of view, seems almost reasonable, even unavoidable.Alas, the end of the book, when Malcolm is in prison and about to convert to Islam, is rushed. There's none of the detail of the Boston and Harlem scenes. Everything happens too fast and seems arbitrary. By then Malcolm has done some terrible things, hurt people who've been good to him profoundly. He's also been betrayed by the woman he loved. One expects some agony, some soul searching, but the book never delves deep at this point. If you've read Malcolm X on why and how he started to read in prison, you know that it was a gradual, desperate process. In the book it feels like he has nothing better to do. The result is that our protagonist, who has been an introspective, intelligent person, now seems shallow and unreflective and the heretofore irreligious Malcolm's looming conversion feels inexplicable.Nevertheless, despite the slow start and the much-too-fast end, I highly recommend this book. As others have said, it's being sold as a Young Adult book but works, except for the ending, as a book for older readers, too. I was riveted, moved, hungry for more: I ordered more books by each of the two authors the day I finished this one.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Interesting historical fiction about Malcolm X written by his daughter. Excellent insight from different time periods of his life. Really liked how it is broken down by "dated" years... Well written.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A vivid, engrossing fictionalized portrait of Malcolm X's youth.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This book is exciting, hard to put down. Its riveting. I can imagine young people reading it and passing it to there friends. His daughter tells her father's story with warmth and understanding, without covering his problems, and flaws. And it is after all, a book for young people.As an adult, though I would have loved to know more about the rest of his life. And what made for the other twists and turns in his life Ah, well, maybe I can hope for a sequel.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book mainly made me want to go read Malcolm X's autobiography. I can see how this book might be an appealing read for middle or high school students.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a work of historical fiction written by the daughter of Malcolm X. Malcolm Little was born in 1925 and lived through the depression, world war II and civil rights. His parents were activist. It tells of his early life more than the later life. A life of drugs and hustle, Zoot suits and Conk hair styles. Malcolm was assassinated when he was in his thirties. He was assassinated by the Nation of Islam.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "X: A Novel" is a fictionalized account of Malcolm Little's journey to become Malcolm X. It explores the life-altering experiences and choices of young, impressionable Malcolm that led to his transformation into a renowned civil rights leader. I didn't know what to expect from this book but it's well told and gripping.

    If you've ever seen the movie "Malcolm X", directed by Spike Lee and starring Denzel Washington, then you'll recognize a lot of the characters from the first part of the movie. Nevertheless, I felt as if I was learning about this rebellious young Malcolm for the first time and in his own words. It's easy to see how he became such a deeply introspective and impassioned leader. The last chapter was especially resonating. There are notes from Ilyasah Shabazz, Malcolm X's daughter and co-author of this book, in the back.

    I was a little disappointed that the characters in Malcolm's life, especially the family members, always felt distant and not quite real. Regardless, this would be a good introduction to Malcolm X for any reader.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Narrated by Dion Graham. This is a semi-fictional account of Malcolm X's teen years through his early 20s, a period of confusion, rebellion, and petty crimes that set him up for the man the world would come to know as a prominent black Muslim leader and activist. His story reflects what happens to many youth: feelings of misguidedness, poor decision-making, feelings of anger and resentment. He found a way out of his directionless morass and that's what we hope every such youth can do. This book could inspire some to make that choice. Graham's performance puts listeners square into the era that Malcolm lived through and the cronies he hung with. Malcolm comes off as earnestly stupid in the part when he tries to start up a Harlem hustle which I didn't buy. Seemed he would have been much savvier going about it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Another nonfiction novel! This book was co-written by Malcolm X's daughter Ilyasah Shabazz and is based on anecdotes of family & friends as well as the written accounts (letters, diaries, etc.) about how Malcolm Little became Malcolm X.For those fans of nonfiction, the 'appendix' at the end in which Shabazz describes what exactly was fact, what was composite and what was fiction will be appreciated. I also liked getting the background timeline and historical perspective provided in the second 'appendix'.Dion Graham was excellent narrating this audiobook. I found the story compelling although I had some difficulty relating to young Malcolm's feeling that life hustling was 'keeping it real'. However, I think that difficulty is personal rather than any fault in the book & I am now much more curious about learning more about Malcolm X.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Brilliant book!! This tells a fascinating tale about the amazing Malcolm X. The narration is very engaging!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The book focuses on the early life of Malcolm X, when he was known as Malcolm Little. It's a fictionalized account so there is some artistic license and filling in of gaps in his biography in order to make a story. My favorite part is the way the words of his father haunt him throughout his early life in this account. The impact his father had begun to have on him is offset by both his death and the words of a teacher which seemed to embody the way the people in power saw him, they way they treated his father. I appreciated that he had both a positive and negative influence to rebel against, it was interesting to see the way those influences interacted to inform his decisions.

    Malcolm Little's road to becoming Malcolm X was not at all what I would have expected. While he had never tried to be a "model minority", as I had been erroneously taught about other Civil Rights leaders, I hadn't expected him to be so disillusioned about the fight so young. I would have just as well assumed that he had always been in the thick of it.

    I loved the shifting names alongside the developing identities. It made sense out of why he would choose to officially change and take off the Little when he did, despite the influence of his father. There's more to a name and what it means than the closest relative who shared it with you.

    I'm so glad I made the change to read this book instead. It was entertaining and made me want to read his actual biography. There's a note at the end that specifies which characters were made up, which simply had pseudonyms, and some composites. It also explains some scenes that were filled in and segments specifically mentioned by Malcolm X in his own writing. As mentioned above, Shabazz is his daughter and had been told stories that wouldn't have been publicly available,  which she shares here. To assume that there is no bias or justifications would likely be erroneous, but so would an assumption that she was particularly attempting some sort of good will or rewriting of the facts. As it is, I'm going to be reading a biography in my future to get the rest of the story too.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    You know, at the beginning, I wasn't totally taken by this book. Part of it might have been that the time hopping didn't work for me so much, though I appreciated its purpose, but I've also been pretty overwhelmed by the rest of my life which has provided ample distraction. However, by the time everything was going pretty much in straight chronological order, I was bummed to put it down, and by the end, it was nearly impossible to even pause reading. By the end, I was totally bowled over. Shabazz and Magoon paint such a thorough picture of Malcolm's complex youth, and even though it's a fictionalized biography, it gives a deeper context to his life and legacy. It's been a while since I've read such a beautifully crafted character, fact or fiction--there is some incredible artistry going on in the authors' collaboration. I want this to get into as many hands--teens and adults--as possible.

    A great effect, as I'm sure is one of the main intentions of this book, is that I really want to read The Autobiography of Malcolm X for real now. I tried reading it several years ago, but I found it difficult to dig in...I was probably too immature. So I read a lot *about* him instead, and watched the movies and documentaries and all, but it's high time get back to it.

    Read it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Ilyasah Shabazz, Malcolm X’s daughter, fictionalizes the teenage years of her civil rights activist father before he finds the Muslim faith in prison. The novel follows Malcolm X’s life as a kid in Michigan to becoming a “hustler” in Boston and Harlem. Malcolm - “Red” - is haunted by the teachings of his father Earl Little to better himself and his race as he falls into the life of jazz, dealing drugs and a woman he can’t be seen in public with. It’s a story of redemption and a young black man trying to understand his place in a society that he believes is trying to tear him, his family and his race into pieces. The beginning of the book is detail rich when it describes Malcolm’s family through a series of flashbacks, but that doesn’t carry throughout the entire novel. The middle of novel is a bit of a slog since it’s 100 pages of repeating how life is a hustle. While this is a young adult novel, it’s an interesting read for anyone curious about Malcolm X’s life or coming-of-age stories in the pre-Civil Rights America.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is a fictionalized account of the early years of Malcolm X’s life before he became a civil rights activist. Based on actual events in his life, his daughter traces the things that made him the man that he became including the death of his father, his mother put into a mental institution, the splitting up of all the kids to different foster homes, his moves to Boston and Harlem up to his incarceration of robbery. This would be a great addition to a social studies curriculum.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I haven't read Malcolm X's autobiography, so I don't know if these stories are new information or not, but he really wasn't a nice guy when he was young. But we can all change, and that's what his caught wants us to remember.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A very well-paced book chronicling the early years of Malcolm X. The language is tight and appropriate for the subject matter. I'm excited to share this book.