Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannin Foundation.

Boots!

Where would we be without books?

Where would we be without good?

No, Tenderberg.

It's a rhetorical question, sir, but where would we be without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and this is Bookworm.

I'm happy to report that my guest today is a debut novelist.

His name is Robert Jones Jr.

The book is called The Prophets.

It's gotten extraordinary reviews from all sorts of people I like,

ranging from Marlon James to Edmund White.

It's really an extraordinary book

because it's asking the reader to imagine

what it would be like

if the Africans who were brought here

and turned into slaves

were in fact to include two men who were having a relationship with one another.

I have been asked that the word gay replace the word homosexual.

Whatever word you feel most comfortable with is the word that feels the right

one for me. Now, the author's name is Robert Jones, Jr. And among the dedications at the front of the

book are Mother Morrison and Father Baldwin.

...