The Occidental Book of the Dead

The Wire meets Colson Whitehead in this audacious, darkly funny and dazzlingly innovative literary crime masterpiece about a black police officer in Atlanta, Georgia - and the fatal shooting of a suspect

'Johnson asks big questions about identity, corruption and American ideals'
TIME, Most Anticipated Books of 2026

George Washington Jonson has been in the Atlanta police force for a decade, patrolling the streets he grew up on and managing to build relationships within the force - especially with Tucker, the veteran police officer and self-described 'redneck' who taught Jonson the ropes.

Now it's 2005 and Jonson himself is tasked with training hot-headed rookie recruits. One night out on patrol with his trainee, Utner, a split-second confrontation with a white teenager takes a violent turn and Utner shoots the teenager dead. As the resulting furore mounts to a fever pitch, it threatens to expose the complex nest of lies that seethes beneath the entire city, and order must be restored.

So far, so Hollywood.

But then a dizzying somersault in the novel's structure upends the narrative and begins an even darker, more complicated and provocative story about racism, power and corruption - building to an unforgettable portrait of a nation divided.