About this item

A harrowing and spellbinding story about family, the complications of mixed-race relationships, misplaced loyalties, and the price athletes pay to entertain - from the critically acclaimed author of Three-Fifths Xavier "Scarecrow" Wallace, a mixed-race MMA fighter on the wrong side of thirty, is facing the fight of his life. Xavier can no longer deny he is losing his battle with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) , or pugilistic dementia. Through the fog of memory loss, migraines, and paranoia, Xavier does his best to stay in shape by training at the Philadelphia gym owned by his cousin-cum-manager, Shot, a retired champion boxer to whom Xavier owes an unpayable debt.Xavier makes ends meet while he waits for the call that will reinstate him after a year-long suspension by teaching youth classes at Shot's gym and by living rent-free in the house of his white father, whom Xavier was forced to commit to a nursing home.



About the Author

John Vercher

John Vercher is a writer currently living in the Philadelphia area with his wife and two sons. He holds a Bachelor's in English from the University of Pittsburgh and an MFA in Creative Writing from the Mountainview Master of Fine Arts program.His fiction has appeared on Akashic Books' Mondays are Murder and Fri-SciFi. He is a contributing writer for Cognoscenti, the thoughts and opinions page of WBUR Boston. Two of his essays published there on race, identity, and parenting were picked up by NPR, and he has appeared on WBUR's Weekend Edition. His non-fiction work has also appeared in Entropy Magazine. You can find him on Twitter @jverch75.



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