Stuff I Read: The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead

The discovery of a mass grave at a notorious Florida reform school for boys sets in motion a series of legislative inquiries. But for a former inmate, now living in New York, it sets in motion bad memories and repercussions of a life decades past that still haunts him. Some old wounds never quite heal in Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 2019 novel, The Nickel Boys.

The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead

As the site for the former Nickel Academy is readied for the next phase of its life, the discovery of a mass grave makes national headlines. When that news reaches Elwood Curtis, an alum of the academy, he’s thrust into unpleasant childhood memories, marked distinctly by the time he spent there. In 1960’s Tallahassee, Elwood was a good kid, working hard and saving money for college. But when he was unjustly arrested and convicted of a crime he didn’t commit, he gets sentenced to hard time at the Nickel Academy, a reform school for boys. It’s there Elwood meets Jack Turner, a boy his age who’s just trying to fly under the radar until he’s released. Turner believes Elwood is going to get himself killed with his naivete about the recently passed Civil Rights Act, but befriends the boy anyway in hopes of helping him survive the horror of a Jim Crow-era prison camp. And the things these boys see and do during their stay at the Nickel Academy changes Elwood’s life forever.

The second Colson Whitehead book I read in 2021, The Nickel Boys falls much closer to the sharp storytelling of Whitehead’s other masterpiece, The Undergroud Railroad. Compelling from start to

finish, Elwood’s tragic story—coming to terms with the innocence he lost while at the Nickel Academy—is utterly fascinating. The hope of brighter days to come in the wake of the Civil Rights movement is contrasted directly by the persistent specter of Jim Crow Florida makes for an anxiety-inducing tale. I can appreciate Whitehead doing his homework, too. The Nickel Academy is based on the Dozier School for Boys, a similar institution that operated from 1899 to 2011, that had exhumed the bodies of upwards of 50 Black boys in mass, unmarked graves. That touch of history, the idea that this happened to some degree, immerses you deeply into the story right up until its gut-punch of a twist ending.

The only minor gripe I have for this novel is its brevity. At 213 pages, I knocked out this briskly paced novel in the better part of a day. While it’s impressive that Whitehead got so much economy from his words (his other books tend to be long-winded), some scenes could have been expanded. It’s not much of a complaint, though; The Nickel Boys was so good, I wanted more.

The Nickel Boys shines a light on the notion that justice takes a highly predatory interest in some people (a notion that is still tragically playing out in the 24-hour news cycle), and that there are people alive today that suffered—and benefitted—from the Jim Crow era and that it really wasn’t that long ago. It’s definitely worth a read.

Pros: Deeply affecting fictionalization of a place that represents the stain on this country’s soul.

Cons: Too… short?

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars.