Think Barry Jenkins's Moonlight but set in the West Midlands, with Bibles instead of crack. A bravura piece of writing, with echoes of Andrea Levy's Small Island. Rainbow Milk is an important and ambitious book. “Eye-poppingly frank, urgent and fresh.” - Financial Times 2020 has been a year of superb debuts and Rainbow Milk is among the best.” - The Observer A novel of huge power and emotional impact, written in language that is sharp, distinctive and often beautiful. “A novel that does what great debuts do-bringing an originality of voice and vision to the form, refreshing our ideas of what is possible in fiction. James Baldwin would be very proud of this book.” - BBC Paul Mendez is now a significant new figure in the literary world. Tthe voice of the character is so strong. He is a unique new voice in the British novel.” - The Sunday Times (London) Mendez never shies away from the melodrama of sex, the cymbal-crashing opera of desire. Ultimately, this is a searing account of the human need for physical connection. “ is more real and generous than most contemporary novels. The writing is delicious and subtle throughout, often punctuated by musical references that ground it in the decades it explores." - The New York Times Book Review "As with writers like Marlon James and Nicole Dennis-Benn, Mendez’s dialect-writing stretches the boundaries of a language owned by no one. Graphic erotica alert! Don't read this book if you like your fiction cosy and middle-of-the-road.” -Bernardine Evaristo, Booker Prize–winning author of Girl, Woman, Other “When did you last read a novel about a young, black, gay, Jehovah’s Witness man from Wolverhampton who flees his community to make his way in London as a prostitute? This might be a debut, but Mendez is an exciting, accomplished and daring storyteller with a great ear for dialogue. “The kind of novel you never knew you were waiting for. An explosive work that reels from sex, to sin, to salvation all the while grappling with what it means to black, gay, British, a son, a father, a lover, even a man. A remarkable debut.” -Marlon James, New York Times bestselling author of Black Leopard, Red Wolf Named one of the five best new paperbacks by The New York Times Book Review But once he arrives he finds himself at a loss for a new center of gravity and turns to sex work, music, and art to create his own notions of love, masculinity, and spirituality.Ī wholly original novel as tender as it is visceral, Rainbow Milk is a bold reckoning with race, class, sexuality, freedom, and religion across generations, time, and cultures.įinalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award for Gay Fiction Blighted with unexpected illness and racism, Norman and his family are resilient but are all too aware that their family will need more than just hope to survive in their new country.Īt the turn of the millennium, Jesse seeks a fresh start in London, escaping a broken immediate family, a repressive religious community, and his depressed hometown in the industrial Black Country. In the 1950s, ex-boxer Norman Alonso has immigrated to Britain from Jamaica with his wife and children in order to secure a brighter future. An essential and revelatory coming-of-age novel from a thrilling new voice, Rainbow Milk follows nineteen-year-old Jesse McCarthy as he grapples with his racial and sexual identities against the backdrop of his Jehovah's Witness upbringing.Nominated for a 34th annual Lambda Literary Award