by Kwame Mbalia
Praise for Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky
“Mbalia expertly weaves a meaningful portrayal of family and community with folklore, myth, and history—including the legacy of the slave trade—creating a fast-paced, heroic series starter.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Mbalia’s African American and West African gods (with villains tied to US chattel slavery and the Middle Passage specifically) touch on the tensions between the cultures, a cultural nuance oft overlooked. Readers who want more than just a taste of Alke will be eager for future books.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Perfectly paced, this cinematic adventure never drags, anchored by Tristan’s conversational narration and balanced by his struggle to cope with a friend’s passing. It brims with heart, humor, and action, successfully crafting a beautifully unified secondary world that brings the power of stories to glorious life.”
—Booklist (starred review)
“This debut novel offers a richly realized world, a conversational, breezy style, and a satisfying conclusion that leaves room for sequels.”
—School Library Journal (starred review)
“Overall a stellar mix of the playful and the serious, the traditional and the original, this novel marks the emergence of a strong new voice in myth-based children’s fantasy.”
—Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books (starred review)
“A brilliant action adventure rooted in African American lore.”
—New York Times best-selling author Jason Reynolds
2020 Coretta Scott King Author Honor Award
Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2019
Chicago Public Library’s Best of the Best Books of 2019
The New York Times 25 Best Children’s Books of 2019
2019 Middle Grade Fiction Nerdie
NCTE Charlotte Huck Award Recommended Book
A Junior Library Guild Selection
Copyright © 2020 by Cake Literary
All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Hyperion, an imprint of Buena Vista Books, Inc. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Hyperion, 125 West End Avenue, New York, New York 10023.
Created in association with Cake Literary
Designed by Tyler Nevins
Map illustration © 2020 by Robert Venables
Cover art © 2020 by Eric Wilkerson
Cover design by Tyler Nevins
ISBN 978-1-368-06802-4
Visit www.DisneyBooks.com
Follow @ReadRiordan
CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
1: Tricksters and Whispers
2: The Sparring Match
3: Two-Piece Special
4: The Spirits Come Calling
5: Buried Trauma
6: Ghost Cats
7: Strong Blood
8: The Man in the Iron-Monster Mask
9: Unspooling a Story
10: Riverboat Rideshare
11: Keelboat Annie
12: Talking Skulls
13: Hero’s Welcome
14: A Race to Trouble
15: When the Gods Fade
16: Bumbletongue Overboard
17: Kulture Vulture
18: Birds of a Feather
19: The City of Lakes
20: Where’s Mami Wata?
21: Boo Hag Blues
22: Juke Joint Jamboree
23: Jollof Rice
24: The Plat-eyes’ Tale
25: I Don’t Want to Fight
26: Get Back Up
27: Return of the Maafa
28: Shadows of Greatness
29: Eye of the Storm
30: Free Mami Wata
31: The Gang’s All Here
32: Beachfront Showdown
33: Hosed Down
34: The World Undone
35: United We Stand
36: I Will Find You
Acknowledgments
About the Author
For the stories across the Diaspora, and the elders who carried them
NOBODY LIKES GETTING PUNCHED IN THE FACE.
Call it a hunch or an educated guess. Either way, I can confirm from firsthand experience that getting punched in the face is way down on the list of enjoyable activities. It’s somewhere between eating a halfway-scraped-off piece of burnt toast and giving yourself a wedgie. Nope. Don’t like it. Especially when it’s accompanied by my grandfather’s trash talk.
POP!
“C’mon, boy! Keep your head moving! Unless you wanna make your living lying down on the mat. You want me to build you a house down there? I can get you a one-room studio, utilities included.”
When I opened my eyes, Granddad was standing over me with his hands on his hips. Well, his mitts on his hips. He wore gray jogging sweats and a crisp white T-shirt that he had probably ironed. His afro, neatly trimmed and nearly all gray, moved from side to side as he grumbled and shook his head. He took off one mitt and held out a massive brown hand with scars on the knuckles. When I reached up with my right glove and he pulled me to my feet, I could feel the strength that had made him a legend in the boxing circuit.
“You gotta move,” Granddad said. He got into a boxer’s crouch and started bobbing and weaving his head. “You’re too stiff in there right now, like something’s holding you back. What’s wrong? You asked for this, remember? You tired?”
We were inside the old barn on my grandparents’ farm. The early-afternoon sun peeked through gaps in the walls, sending warm yellow rays down in stripes across the packed dirt floor. Granddad and I had been working all day—clearing out junk, sweeping, stuff like that. A makeshift boxing ring now stood in the middle of the open space, and a few other adults were setting up benches.
Why, I hear you asking, did I volunteer for this?
Well, a few days ago, Granddad had gotten a call from an old buddy he knew back on the amateur boxing circuit, now a trainer himself. A practice bout for one of his new prospects had been canceled because of a storm, and he wanted to know if Granddad knew of anyone they could spar with.
Why yes, I imagined Granddad saying, I have the perfect sparring partner. No, don’t worry, he’s up for the challenge.
That, my friends, isn’t volunteering. That’s called being volun-told.
So I had a sparring match in an hour or so, and I was not looking forward to it, but Granddad had insisted I get in one good match before I left to go back home to Chicago.
Yay.
But don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t backing down. I wanted the challenge. Kept me distracted. Helped suppress unwanted thoughts. Mr. Richardson, my counselor, called them intrusive thoughts. Busy hands, calm mind.
And when you trained with Granddad, your hands stayed busy.
“No, sir, I’m not tired.” I hopped up, slammed my gloves together, and started the routine again.
Granddad held up his mitts, and I let my hands go to work.
“All right, boy,” my grandfather said. “One-two.”
I took a deep breath and fired off the punch combination. Sharp. Quick. Had to be better. Had to get stronger. Step forward, twist the hips, snap off a punch.
Faster.
FASTER.
FAST—
“All right, boy, all right. Don’t get too worked up.” Granddad backed away and dropped the mitts. I stopped in mid-jab, breathing hard. “I told you, we’re warming up. What’s gotten into you?�
��
I started to answer, then closed my mouth. I didn’t know how to explain my need to improve, the weight I felt on my shoulders.
Granddad watched me closely. “Take a deep breath. You sure you ain’t tired? I heard you up late last night, then early this morning. You getting enough sleep?”
I bounced on my feet. “I’m okay, Granddad. I’m ready.”
“I’ll tell you when you’re ready. Just breathe. You look tired.”
I rolled my neck, trying to loosen up, looking everywhere around the barn instead of at Granddad. Pictures and posters decorated the walls, detailing fights from years past, and faded brown boxing gloves dangled from a beam running across the high two-story ceiling. But the real eye-catcher was a giant mural depicting two men, a weary boxer with one fist up as he curled a bicep, and his cornerman, towel slung over his shoulder, standing behind him with both arms flexed.
It was Alvin Strong, my dad, the night he defended his championship for the first time, and his trainer, Walter Strong—Granddad.
I once asked Granddad why he’d chosen to commemorate that night and not the time Dad had won the belt in the first place. He’d scratched his beard, then made a fist and flexed, like Dad in the mural. “Taking the belt was a feat, I’ll grant you. Somethin’ hard, worthy of a mural, I suppose. But it’s one thing to take the belt when don’t nobody see you coming. It’s another to stare down an entire country while you got a target on your back, and then beat them challengers into submission. It’s hard to win a belt…. It’s even harder to keep it.”
As I shook my arms to loosen them and then slipped my mouthpiece back in, Granddad stood beneath that mural. He might have been older, skinnier, with more wrinkles and less hair, but the same strength still radiated from him. I had that strength, too. I’d used it before, and I was going to have to use it again. Because, as much as it pained me, I had asked to train. I needed to get stronger.
“I’m okay, Granddad. Honest,” I said, pounding my gloves together again. “I’m not tired at all.”
“Mm-hmm. We’ll see. Here we go. One-two. One-two. Good. Hook coming in. One-two. One-two. Tuck that chin in, boy, show these hands some respect! One-two. That’s it, that’s the Walter Strong special. Watch it, now. Good!”
POP! POP!
I snapped lefts and rights at the mitts as Granddad called the cadence, and for a while I did good. When the hooks came in from either direction, I ducked them, and when the straights came in, I dodged them, weaving from side to side so they went sailing by. A rhythm had me bouncing on my feet and practicing the sweet science. It felt good. I got into a groove.
POP! POP!
And then it happened.
A sound drifted past my ear. Something tiny and faint. A breath of wind brushed my cheek. A chill gripped my chest, making it hard to breathe.
Tristan…
Someone whispered my name. And right after that, another sound reached my ears. My heart seized up. My fists dropped as I turned toward whatever—or whoever—it was.
“Tristan!”
I recovered too late.
WHAP!
The hook came again and clipped the side of my head, sending me head over heels. It didn’t hurt—it just knocked me upside down—but Granddad grew upset. He took off the mitts and tossed them out of the ring.
“Now what done got into you?! What is so fascinating that you’d take a punch from your opponent just to get a peek at it? Hmm? A piece of trash on the ground? You ain’t even here—you off somewhere in your head!”
I didn’t answer. Something fluttered across the floor, tumbling between the feet of the adults who were trying hard to not look at us. It was a receipt, crumpled up and harmless. I let out a shaky breath. Granddad waited, then sighed and motioned for me to come over. He unlaced the gloves and pulled them off, then undid the wraps on my hands and wrists. He worked quickly, then gathered up everything and stared at the mural on the barn wall.
“Boy,” he said without looking at me. “Let’s take fifteen. I need to get some water in me anyway. You look exhausted, and you’re chewing on something in that head of yours and need to spit it out. Whatever it is, you can’t bring that into the ring. Distractions will be the end of you before your opponent throws a single punch.”
He stepped out of the ring and stuffed the equipment into a giant faded-green army duffel. He strained once, then stopped and took a deep breath. With a grunt, he lifted the bag over his shoulders and headed off. “I’ll be back with the body pads,” he said over his shoulder. “Then we’re going to start over. I expect you to be ready to get serious.”
Granddad marched out and the spectators followed him, leaving me alone in the barn, staring at the balled-up receipt. Tiny. Like a small wad of cotton. That had bad associations for me. But the piece of paper wasn’t the actual distraction. I just couldn’t tell Granddad that. A whisper? He would’ve stared at me like I’d sprouted an extra armpit on my forehead. And who could blame him?
How could I tell him that, just for a second, I’d thought I heard a faint drumbeat?
A miffed, cultured voice jerked me out of my thoughts.
“You know, boy, the least you could do is remove me from your sweaty pocket before you start prancing about in your silly outfit and gloves. Hurry up and let me breathe. Or do you plan on moping forever?”
It came from my training shorts. I rolled my eyes and pulled out a shiny black phone with a gold spider emblem on the back, sleek and brand-new. When I raised it, the screen blinked on and a splash screen appeared—a fancy box with the word STORY written inside it. The image faded away, and in its place appeared a tiny brown man stomping back and forth, hopping over glowing app icons and kicking aside the clock. He wore flip-flops, pants that were either too short or shorts that were too long, and a T-shirt with a grinning spider on it. Anansi’s sense of style was somewhere between lazy dad and retro-chic teen, and I could only shake my head.
Why was Anansi, the original trickster, the master of storytelling, the weaver of tales and webs of mischief, inside my phone?
Great question!
Because a month ago a tiny loudmouth stole my dead best friend’s journal.
Because in my anger I punched a hole into a different realm where Black folktale heroes and African gods walk around like you and me.
Because I accidentally brought a diabolical haint with me, stirring up an even more ancient evil.
Because I caught Anansi trying to use all the confusion to gain power for himself instead of helping the people, and this was his punishment.
Because I am an Anansesem, a carrier and spreader of stories, and this phone is the Story Box, the vessel in which those stories are stored, and which it is my responsibility to watch over and refill.
Because I got the hookup, that’s why. Now stop asking questions.
Anyway, that was a month ago. It had been thirty days since Eddie—well, his spirit, actually, since he’s my dead best friend—told me good-bye for the last time. Since then I’d read aloud every word in the journal he left me and recorded it with the Listen Chile app on the SBP (Story Box Phone—give me a break, let me be lazy).
The SBP’s screen went blank, and then the lock screen appeared. Anansi glanced at the Story Box logo, then sat down and leaned his back against it. He pulled a black pixel out of the background and began to toss it against the edge of the screen like a ball.
“Look,” he said gently. “I know you and I haven’t seen eye to eye….”
I snorted.
“And we might’ve gotten off on the wrong foot—”
“You tried to get the people of Isihlangu to throw us in their dungeons,” I said with a raised eyebrow.
Anansi flapped his hand and waved the words away. “Stop living in the past. We have to look toward the future. I am due for a reprieve from this prison soon, and that can’t happen if you don’t pay attention to incoming fists. Who will tell old Nyame I fulfilled my obligations if you’re unconscious? Who will transc
ribe your grandmother’s fantastic key lime pie recipe for me? No, no, you must focus.”
I shrugged and started rewrapping my hands. Granddad would be back any minute now, and I needed to be ready. If I could just get through this match, the rest of the week would fly by, and then I’d be on my way back to Chicago. “I’ll be fine.”
“It appears to me you’re not acting fine.”
“I’m good. Relax.”
Anansi raised an eyebrow. “And the nightmares?”
Whispers drifted past my ear again. A rhythm pulsed from somewhere out in the cornfield behind the barn—a fast drumbeat that sent my heart racing. I hadn’t told anyone about the bad dreams that had sent me lurching up in bed every night since returning from Alke. This is why you can’t leave a trickster god on your nightstand while you sleep. I tugged on my gloves, then stood. “I’ll. Be. Fine.”
“You can’t punch your way out of everything, boy. Sooner or later you’ll find someone or something that punches harder. Trust me.”
Before I could respond to that startling piece of wisdom, the barn door creaked open. Granddad walked in; sure enough, he wasn’t alone. A crowd gathered behind him, and Nana—my grandmother—stood by his side, but my eyes were on the person standing next to him.
“By my eight ashy legs,” Anansi whispered. “That boy is huge!”
“Let’s go, boy—up and at ’em,” Granddad said. “It’s time to spar.”
LIFE ISN’T FAIR.
That’s what every adult has said when I’ve told them something wasn’t fair. You’ve probably heard the same thing. Oh, nothing’s fair. You have to play the cards you’re dealt. Well, why are we even playing cards? I don’t even like card games!
Anyway…
What really wasn’t fair was my sparring partner. His name was Reggie Janson, and he stood taller than most of the adults surrounding the ring. Wider, too. I mean, even his muscles had muscles. Smooth brown skin, JAWBREAKER scrawled in graffiti print on his hoodie and trunks, and a face pulled into a scowl that made him look meaner than the neighborhood dog everyone steers clear of. His legs were tree trunks and his gloves bowling balls. In short—
“You might want to rethink this,” Anansi said into my ear. I was wearing my earbuds in the hope of tuning out the prefight noise and commotion, but what I got was trickster-god color commentary over some chopped-and-screwed classic hip-hop songs. Yep, apparently Anansi had discovered streaming and was currently obsessed with Houston rap.
