This next book I requested an ARC of way back in fall of 2023 and I just sort of lost track of it. Hush Harbor, by Anise Vance, is a unflinching look at a revolutionary project surrounded on all sides, with an uncertain future both internal and external.

A black teenager is murdered by the police in Bliss City, New Jersey fomenting an uprising. The Prince siblings lead a revolution and reclaim an abandoned housing project, creating a place devoid of white supremacy. Many flock there to shore up its defenses and protect the community from the growing racist backlash spearheaded by one of the murderous cops. But when the mayor who is secretly friendly to the denizens of Hush Harbor is replaced by the more hardline chief of police, the Prince’s differing beliefs on how to survive cause internal strife. Will the citizens of Hush Harbor be able to mount a defense against the might of the city?

Vance’s debut is an unglorified look at the inner workings of a small revolution. He pulls no punches when it comes to characterizing the people who would gravitate to Hush Harbor. They are human, both idealistic and flawed. They are shaped by the baggage they carry, whether it is handled with spite or love. Everyone has their own blind spots, the things they are unwilling to compromise on, and the future they wish to see. Vance does an excellent job of weaving their history’s into the narrative, giving each character a life of their own.

I was impressed that each perspective also had a different way of engaging with their past. Malik, a young man who drives up from Atlanta because his mentor is involved, is guided by his powerlessness. He exists in the now, and therefore the little bits of his past that filter through are small glimpses of when he felt he should be doing more. These little acts are portrayed as short flashes of memory that reground him in the moment, pushing him to his final act. Malik is juxtaposed against Jeremiah Prince, one of the leaders of the revolution, who sees his life in a more linear fashion. A long chain of events that brought him to where he is now, written from the moment he meets the boy, who’s death is the flashpoint of the revolution. Jeremiah, when he recollects his past in the present, views his life as a series of moves and countermoves like a chessboard. Vance doesn’t just make this explicit in how he describes the characters though, he writes it into the narrative. Malik’s perspective exists in the now, peppered with memories. Jeremiah however, has a full flashback of his life leading to the revolution. This perspective heavy writing doesn’t exist with these two either, every character is given a similar treatment.

Despite the low page count, Vance follows several characters and his writing carries it through. Each perspective feels distinct in how they look at things, what is important to them, and the problems they highlight within Hush Harbor’s short history. It’s a lush dive into a specific time and place and the conditions that it can exist in. Vance grounds the world vividly, opening a path for such a place to exist. The federal and state governments are stretched thin as California has finally had the big earthquake, and is physically separated from the rest of the continental United States. The state is not as overbearing as it could be, but the threat of force remains if they step out of line. But the new mayor sees the whole stunt as a provocation and aims to crack down. These issues are all attended to in varying degrees of interest through the different characters. You don’t even learn certain aspects about the world until certain characters bring it up because the others are focused on various things.

The final bit I want to highlight about Hush Harbor is its depiction of the victories and the frustrations of trying to birth a new world. Vance looks sincerely at the situation and tries to highlight the anxieties that come with being set upon by all sides. There are incredibly tender moments that exist within the story, as well and incredibly uncomfortable and frank discussions of strategy. Vance lets everything play out though, refusing to balk at implications and the roads that characters have been led to. Nova Prince is the perfect foil to her brother Jeremiah, even if she has her own flaws. This world does not have a single paragon, despite the people who populate it trying to create one. It’s a stressful environment even if it’s more free. You never really know the direction Vance is going to go, but that is part of the beauty and truthfullness of Vance’s story. The ending is one for the books in how scary the future can truly be.

I fucked up by not reading Hush Harbor when I first got my hands on it. If you want to read a story with incredible writing, memorable characters, and the realities of revolution, this is the book. It’s concise and delivers its punches exactly where they need to land. I hope Vance continues to write more because his voice is intoxicating.

Rating: Hush Harbor – Rush To It’s Defense
-Alex

An ARC of this book was provided to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The thoughts on this book are my own.

Why is this given the subject headings of literary when it reads almost YA? I loved it--it's a too real dystopia. More like alternative history that is only in 2030. The friendships and relationships were solid and I enjoyed the snippets of black history and freedom fighters throughout the book. Strongly recommend this to high school readers.

Lot to like here. Activism, smooth and poetic writing, characters and a storyline with heart. Love the connection to history--in antebellum times a "hush harbor" was a place where slaves could gather in secret to practice their religious traditions. Anise Vance contemporizes this idea of a secret gathering place in a story about police brutality and racism, set in 2030. Ambitious and worthy of your read.

This was a compelling and engaging read. I thought the characters were pretty well fleshed out and there was quite a lot of dialogue about ways in which to produce change.

I found this book to be very interesting and intriguing. I would recommend this a friend because this is a book for everyone. I really enjoyed emerging myself into this book and it was just wonderful.

In the near future world of Hush Harbor, tension is at an all time high. After the police murder an unarmed black teenager, a group of protestors take control of a small area in New Jersey. This sanctuary, they call Hush Harbor. They are quickly surrounded by armed guards; the standoff has no end in sight. The leaders of Hush Harbor know that radical change is necessary, but disagree on how far they are willing to go. Will this revolution bring about true change, or will they be quietly swept under the rug?

This novel was deeply thought provoking and fairly depressing. The police have all the power, and it's a nightmare to think about something like this happening. Each section of the novel has a different narrator, and I really enjoyed the varying perspectives. I would have preferred a bit more worldbuilding though, instead of just being thrown into this near future USA with little understanding of how the rest of the country/world are progressing. A timely and heartwrenching story that is worth the read.

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

It took a while to get into this book, as we enter in the middle of an intense scene. But the themes and too-close-to-reality plot are worth sticking it through. Nova and Jeremiah are our main characters, leading a revolution inspired by their ancestors and hoping to dismantle white supremacy. I feel like this book tried to tackle a lot of big questions, and while the characters were strong and the story compelling, the questions remain big and more complicated.

I had the opportunity to read an advanced readers copy of Anise Vance's debut novel Hush Harbor, from NetGalley and the publisher. This is a book which had a lot of potential, but I ultimately feel needed to be 100 pages longer.

It is the story of a "racial reckoning" in an American city after the death of a young Black man (teenager really) at the hands of police, and the resistance tha emerged after the two officers were not indicted for the shooting. It takes place in an America similar to ours, but after an ecological crisis in which most of California falls into the Pacific due to the "big one." This is told in just a few pages, and if anything suggests that the lost of the west coast caused understandable economic turmoil. In all honesty, I am not sure why the California collapse, if that is what we call it, was in the book. It wasn't necessary to the story.

Hush Harbor was the creation of a resistance movement, where a small part of the city, an abandoned housing project, becomes a sort of self-governing zone. In all honesty, the nature of what Hush Harbor entailed was left somewhat vague, but it was a resistance cell of several hundred people, At first I envisioned some sort of island which was physically isolated from the rest of the city. But really, Hush Harbor was a metaphor for a vision of the future, drawing on the name of the places enslaved people would worship..

"At a hush harbor, slaves could pray to whomever or whatever they wished. They could shout and dance and speak in languages unknown to their foreing masters. THey could create a world spirtually ditinct from the ones in which they toiled….. it was a perfect name, and ode to the past and the futre. At their newly baptized hush harbor, greed and malice and the stink of rotten hearts would remain outside the projects’ gates. They would live as though in prayer, hopeful and unsure of their mark, but free, or at least as free as destiny would allow." (p. 235).

The story of this resistance movement, of this hoped for revolution is told in 284 pages, broke into several parts, each told from the perspective of different characters, each of whom were critical players in the movement's leadership, . Over the first 200 pages the story and building conflict comes together. But in many ways, I felt like there was too much character development which came at the cost of moving the story forward, and not enough time given to the actual conflict, and especially, the end of the book.. One major revelation near the end, as to the funders behind the movement was never really dealt with, and the book just felt rushed to a premature end.

Now there is a risk of over-writing a book, but the scope of what the author was writing, and the world the reader was being invited to get immersed in, deserved more.

After a young, black, unarmed teen is shot and killed by police, a revolution is formed in an abandoned housing project called Hush Harbor, in honor of the secret spaces their enslaved ancestors would gather. Jeremiah Prince and his sister, Nova, are the leaders, but their ideological differences regarding how the movement should proceed differ. When a new mayor with ties to white supremacists threatens the group and locks the city down, they collectively must come up with a plan of survival.

As much as I thought this novel would be about the revolution and protests and marching - this was mostly about an already established, what felt more like a commune, movement. This also focused on the personal experience of the members, especially Malik, who, at the beginning of the novel, was getting recruited right in the middle of it all.

The story was still good and I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t what I was expecting going into it. Of course the issues with racism and white supremacy are the main focus of this book and the author did a wonderful job at writing those. I think I may have struggled with the writing style a bit. It would go from super formalic and dense to a whole page full of dialogue with no movement indication. It didn’t catch my emotions and though I was interested in the story, I didn’t care too much for the characters, minus Jeremiah’s story.

Overall, this was still a good story and an important one at that. The debut writings of this author still intrigue me to read more of his when the next release comes.

*Thank you Hanover Square Press and NetGalley for a digital advance copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review

This novel is about a resistance group that has risen up due to the killing of an unarmed black teen by police. The group takes over an abandoned housing project that their ancestors used to gather and pray. They start calling it Hush Harbor. Things are going well until there are differences of opinions of Jeremiah and Nova, the heads of the group. They are at odds in regards to what they should do next.
The new mayor locks the city down because of the group. News that the mayor has ties to white supremacists changes everything. The group must make serious decisions to save what they gained.
I would recommend.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to Hanover Square Press for the copy of this book!

Hush Harbor is a very unique look at a scenario we're all too familiar with: the murder of an unarmed Black teenager. In response to the shooting, siblings Jeremiah and Nova start a resistance in an abandoned housing project and call it Hush Harbor. I loved the dystopian take on the dynamics that white supremacy brings to society, and thought this was a fast-paced and fresh take.

With what I expected from a book about resistance and taking control of a section of a town, I expected a higher level of intensity and action. I was thinking I would be reading about protests and marching in the street and Blank Panther type activism. I was thinking about the 1985 MOVE bombing. Instead it almost felt like a book about a well-established and smooth running commune. I don't know how much of it was due to the writing style or how much was due to the events that were described in the narrative, but it almost felt more like a story about a few of the members/leaders of the group and their personal interaction than the movement itself. I wanted something closer to a revolution and felt that this fell short of that. It was still a good story and I did enjoy it. I would have enjoyed it more if there had been more heightened drama.

In a headline we know all too well, an unarmed Black man is shot and killed by the police causing an uprising from citizens frustrated with the injustice. A revolution is soon formed; the members taking over an abandoned housing project they call Hush Harbor in honor of the secret spaces their enslaved ancestors would gather. As the group fights for their survival against a faction of white supremacists, their leader’s ideological differences threaten to further harm them as they try to figure out, what next?

Sometimes books are scary because of how much they represent the horrors of our reality. Anise Vance manages to create a dystopian society that feels about 2 degrees from our current society and that is the most terrifying part of this story. The setting, intensity, and fast paced plot was spot on. However, I did feel as though we are dropped into the story midway and as a result, struggled to orient myself. I think I needed a bit more world building at the start to truly connect and *click-in* to the story.

Read if you like:
•speculative fiction
•atmospheric settings
•movie like books
•dystopian rooted in reality
•focus on social injustice

All in all, this is an impressive debut and I look forward to reading more from Vance in the future. Thank you HTP Books and Harper Audio for the gifted copies in exchange for my honest review.

*3-3.5 stars

A very original novel about police brutality and racism. The story is set in the year 2030, where a group of protesters occupy a deserted housing project in Bliss, NJ, after an unarmed black teen named Kemba is shot and killed by police who are later found innocent of any wrong doing.

The leaders of this revolution are brother and sister, Jeremiah and Nova Prince. Jeremiah was the boy's history teacher and he was seeking to adopt him, so he was particularly outraged by his death and the lack of justice to be found through the legal system. They call the area they have claimed Hush Harbor and seek 'to build an entirely new society free from white supremacy.'

Jeremiah and his sister have differing opinions about how to achieve their goals. He 'thinks he can make justice by attacking power.' Nova thinks 'we need to rewrite the definition of power.' Can this small revolution succeed? Or is it doomed from the start?

The issues of racism and white supremacy are front and center in this story--what has brought us to this point and how to change an unjust system. Is violence the way to go or can a peaceful way be found? I found the beginning a bit confusing as it jumps right into the middle of the uprising as a recruited member arrives on scene. I kept wondering what these people planned to do. What did they think the response would be to their rebellion and how would they counter that? The characters were intelligent and likable but seemed to have vastly different goals. This all comes together in a pretty exciting conclusion.

I received an arc of this new novel from the author and publisher via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and the opinions expressed are my own.

I am DNFing this book, not because its bad (it isn't), but because this book just isn't for me. My rating is a 4 because I can see the talent in the author and the value in a book like this. Right now, I am seeking books that are more of an escape, and this confronts *important* real-life issues. My one main criticism for this, though, is that you're thrown into this world without much explanation. It is almost as if you enter the story in the middle, rather than the beginning. This made it hard for me to orient myself as a reader. Still, I think that this could be a winner for other readers.

Thank you to htp books for letting me read this one early. This book comes out September 5.

Wowee what a great story. This book really is such a fast read. It’s hard not to get sucked into this story. I really enjoyed this one.

Dark and heart racing from start the finish the author weaves a story that snatches your attention from the first page and doesn’t let go until the very end.

This book burns slow and then hot. It begins with a lot of character development and back story, then at about the halfway mark explodes with nonstop action to the end.
What happens when a resistance group goes up against a group of powerful white supremicists? What actions should they take? Should they take a mostly self-defensive stance or go on the offensive? Are there actions that are beyond the pale, even if their enemies do them? How far is too far? These are moral questions the group is faced with, and they disagree amongst themselves.
The story doesn't give us the answer. The end is vague, and I think that's by design. Different people will read different things into it.
Very thought-provoking book and should initiate much discussion.
Received a free galley from NetGalley. Thank you for the opportunity to review it.

The overall idea was interesting & the writing was great. I was definitely much more invested in the story once I reached the halfway point of the novel.
But I will say that overall I was more than slightly annoyed with the lack of (for a better way to phrase this) the overall world building because I had so many questions concerning Hush Harbor the actual place & their day to day survival & other nitty gritty stuff. But all of that took a back seat to the revolution part of the story & while I understand why, you can't have one without the other.
Also missing or mentioned far too briefly was why the US was in what appeared to be a fragmented state that allowed for this story to be happening at all.
I'll read this author again but this book was a miss for me.

Great introduction to a new author for me, and a wonderful addition to our collection for our patrons. Such a wonderful book for these times I look forward to more! THANK you!