There’s a lot to admire in this debut novel—especially the ambition behind it. Great Black Hope is voice-driven, stylistically sharp, and emotionally complex. The writing is often beautiful, with standout passages that stop you in your tracks. It’s a book deeply engaged with questions of race, class, grief, and visibility—especially how Black pain is consumed, distorted, and turned into spectacle.

At the center is Smith, a young queer Black man living in New York City, navigating grief, public perception, and his own spiraling internal world. The novel feels less like a straightforward narrative and more like a mood piece—lyrical, fractured, and intentionally disorienting at times. There’s a lot of commentary woven in—about performative empathy, media narratives, systemic injustice—and some of it really lands.

Still, I struggled to feel fully immersed. While the ideas are sharp and the structure bold, I often felt at a distance from Smith emotionally. The pacing is slow and the plot elliptical by design, which may work better for readers drawn to more introspective or experimental storytelling. I appreciated what the novel was doing more than I was moved by it in the moment.

That said, there are lines and images from this book I’ll be thinking about for a while—and I’m glad I read it. It’s clear the author is wrestling with something deeply personal here, and that vulnerability gives the novel weight. If you’re drawn to meditative literary fiction that lingers in grief, identity, and the stories society tells about Black lives, this one is worth your time. Thank you to Summit Books for the free ebook to review. 3.5 stars

I wasn’t sure how to quite rate this book. It was written with easy, descriptive prose but the storyline, for me, just wasn’t there. I was bored through the majority of the book. I didn’t connect to any of the characters and the only emotion I felt was an occasional anger/pity at some of them for squandering what they had. Even then, it was momentary as I just really didn’t care what happened. I did like Smith’s new set of friends, especially O. Maybe that is what the author was trying to say, that these new friends were Smith’s hope for the future. Real, gritty, feeling people; that actually cared about others.

Overall, a well written but slow (and for me, boring) book. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Although not my typically genre thoguth that This book was a pretty good. I enjoyed the views on ideentity and exploration and how we see privilege, class and race.

Not super fond of the prose but I think most people would enjoy this novel.

I went into this book expecting it to be more of a mystery while the main character tries to find out what happened to his friend/roommate. It fell flat for me when the story winds up and down and all around with side stories that don’t seem to have anything to do with the plot. It was very slow and I felt like I “had” to pick it back up every time. I just wish for a bit faster dialed in story.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a quick and entertaining read that I finished in a few hours.
A well written story that kept me hooked from the very beginning.
The characters draw you in and keeps you flipping the pages.
The characters were all realistic and very well developed.
I really enjoyed the writing style. I found myself hooked, turning the pages.

3.5 stars. Franklin's debut is well written and evokes a great sense of the New York party scene. The characters and scenes are well developed, and the writing draws the reader into the moment. This one was a bit slower paced and more meandering than I was looking for at the moment, but I will definitely check out more of Franklin's work in the future.

Great Black Hope is Rob Franklin’s debut novel and it’s a stunner. It centers Smith, a queer Black twentysomething man living a life of excess in New York City: champagne, cocaine, glamor, afterparties, and more. Raised in the Southern Black upper middle class (his father is the retired president of an HBCU) and educated in the city, he exists in a precarious bubble of privilege. But at the novel’s outset, that bubble has popped: his friend, Elle, has been brutally and mysteriously murdered, and Smith is arrested for drug possession during a bender in the Hamptons. What follows is Smith’s haphazard, circuitous, sometimes absurd, and often painful journey of self-reflection and recalibration—of confronting his substance use and his grief, of recognizing how respectability and proximity to whiteness have insulated him from forms of black and queer community, and of asking big questions about his career, his ambition, and his purpose.
…
Because so much of this book is about Smith’s realizations—both sudden and gradual—about himself and the world that he’s built/has been built around him, I kept thinking as I was reading about the ancient Greek concept of apocálypsis. This word is often translated as “apocalypse” and today is used to refer to the end of the world. But its original meaning is something closer to “the lifting of the veil,” to revelation, to those moments when something previously hidden is uncovered and laid bare. Smith experiences so many lifting of the veils throughout this book, so many moments of revelation. Franklin’s prose is so exquisite in its treatment of these moments. He’s a poet, and he knows exactly how to calibrate a word or phrase for maximum impact. There were so many passages in this book that I had to stop myself and re-read, stunned as I was by the unexpected beauty and striking specificity of Franklin’s language, perfectly matched to Smith’s interior transformations. If you love books with messy and tragic characters, or books in which the character development is both subtle and well earned, Great Black Hope is definitely for you!

Black Hope is a sharp and compelling debut that blends biting social commentary with intimate reflections on race, class, queerness, and the illusion of safety within privilege. Rob Franklin has a keen eye for detail and a distinctive voice—observant, funny, and emotionally intelligent. The novel captures the tension of being both inside and outside elite spaces, and David Smith is a layered, often conflicted protagonist whose journey is absorbing even when you’re not quite sure where he’s headed. At times, the structure felt a bit diffuse, and some secondary characters could’ve used more depth, but the book delivers plenty to admire: rich prose, insightful critiques, and an unflinching look at the performance of belonging. It’s a strong literary debut, full of promise, and Franklin is clearly a writer to watch. Thank you to Summit and Simon & Schuster for the gifted copy.

📚 Read this if you like:
– Literary fiction with a satirical edge
– Stories about identity, performance, and privilege
– East Coast prep school vibes meets modern social critique
– Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid, Cleanness by Garth Greenwell, Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson
– Thoughtful explorations of addiction and grief in upper-crust spaces

Great. Black Hope is a brilliant and searing debut. I loved Rob Franklin's voice as a writer, both tender and eviscerating, and I absolutely loved this social commentary on the cultural juxtapositions present in the social circles of New York City and the Hamptons. I also felt this was a really close to the chest discussion of drug use and addiction from a young voice and perspective, one I really quite appreciated. Definitely one of my top reads of 2025. Congrats to Rob Franklin and thanks to Summit for the gifted copy.

Great Black Hope is ideal for readers drawn to introspective narratives exploring the intersection of race, privilege, and societal structures through the lens of complex characters navigating personal and systemic turmoil.

I featured Great Black Hope in my June 2025 new releases video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6q31xhbo1tE, and though I have not read it yet, I am so excited to and expect 5 stars! I will update here when I post a follow up review or vlog.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for the advanced reader copy.

Maybe I read this at the wrong time or something, but I couldn't get into this book (I tried both ebook and audiobook). I struggled to keep track of what was happening and at the same time felt like nothing was happening. This is getting good buzz, though, so it's just not for me.

Sadly I just couldn’t relate to this style of writing. The author tries to embellish his writing craft and had sentences that rambled on with colorful narrative and I found I completely lost the point and had to reread many sentences.

The story was superficial. I couldn’t relate to any of the characters, and most characters so privileged and entitled they were not even likable. This is definitely not a crime thriller but a boring story with creative colorful sentences.

Many thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

I may have liked this more if it hadn’t been expecting something thriller-y. I appreciated the take(s) on substance use/addiction, but overall the book didn’t do anything for me. That said, I really appreciate the ARC and would still consider reading whatever the author does next.

Great Black Hope feels like a hard one for me to review because based on how the publisher was making the book seem, I expected something completely different. I was expecting a literary mystery due to the synopsis, but that is not what Great Black Hope is. I would say that Great Black Hope is a character study of Smith, a gay Black man living in NYC who's in need of a change. After he is caught with drugs and charged on vacation, he starts to question the life he's currently living. He doesn't get fulfillment in his career and his friendships feel very superficial. Smith starts to wonder what's next for him. In the periphery there is also questions on who killed an acquaintance of his, who had a substance abuse problem. This is the mystery that seemed to be question in the synopsis. It is such a secondary storyline that it isn't a central point of the story.

While I did enjoy Franklin's writing style, I don't think this will be a story that will stick with me long term. I'd be interested in reading more from Franklin in the future.

Thank you to Simon Books and Netgalley for a copy in exchange for review consideration.

It is Labor Day weekend in the Hamptons in 2019 and David Smith, a 25 year old, tall, “bark brown and quietly handsome” young man is arrested for possession of cocaine. Smith, a Stanford graduate and an analyst at a tech company, informs his parents of his arrest. His mother, a Harvard-trained physician, collapses, whereas his father, a retired university professor, asks just a single question, “What now?” We learn later in the novel why the Smiths believe that their privilege is so precarious that their son’s arrest could topple their elite status. Smith’s maternal ancestors had been sharecroppers and his grandmother, Gale, migrated to Houston at fifteen, “fleeing terror in the snarling South.” Gale’s singular focus took her through law school, and her four children left home for the Ivy-league, becoming doctors and lawyers. To the Smiths, Smith’s “incident” dramatized that they could not grow complacent because to do so “was to threaten slipping.”

Smith and his father hire the attorney with “local color” who claimed to know the courts and the parties involved. Smith obtains a drug and alcohol evaluation from Dr. Mancini who, according to his attorney, is well-liked by the local judges, and attends mid-numbing weekly meetings led by Dr. Mancini as well as AA meetings. When Dr. Mancini misunderstands a comment made by Smith, Smith leans into the trope of the gay Black boy with the absentee father and the contemptible single mother. “He’d seen the trailer for ‘Moonlight.’”

While waiting for his delayed hearing, Smith also contends with the death of his roommate, Elle England, who was found dead after leaving a club with an unidentified man. Smith had lived with Elle in NYC after they both graduated from Stanford which, for Smith “unearthed an elaborate, unknown world of coastal prepsters and the spawn of oligarchs trailed relentlessly by rumors of wealth so vast, it necessitated security detail. . . .” Smith is being pursued by a Vanity Fair reporter who wishes to speak to Elle’s closest friends to report a longer piece that “would recenter her humanity.”

Smith’s best friend from Stanford, Carolyn Ashley is, like Elle was, beautiful, glamorous, and from an elegant coastal family entrenched in the arts. Carolyn works as a studio assistant for an interior designer named Dimitri Petrovna, known for “re-outfitting the homes of Manhattan’s rich in post-Soviet austerity.” She was unapologetic about what she desired, even when it teetered on narcissism, and she forfeited her latest bid for sobriety by pursuing a married restauranteur. Smith recognized that Elle and Carolyn could not seem worldly if their world only consisted of the boarding-school set, so they looked to Smith “and the other brown, queer interlopers who passed through their parties — as a guide to an exotic landscape.”

With a chorus of high profile blurbs in place prior to publication, Franklin’s highly anticipated debut novel is set to be the summer’s literary sensation. It does not disappoint. Smith is such a fabulous character who is privileged and protected by virtue of his elite status, but vulnerable because of his race and sexuality. It is a whip smart novel with lacerating observations about race, class, and identity. The book is replete with caustically funny set pieces and sly commentary on the glamorous set and the Black American elite who Franklin observes, either “adopt the twice-as-good ethos of their parents’ generation or rebel and in that rebellion sacrifice themselves.” Thank you Simon & Schuster and Net Galley for an advance copy of this thoroughly engaging novel.

"Of course, he thought, Black pain was always spectacle, was always entertainment. In viral videos and abstract paintings, in policy, medicine, and history, their humanity was so incidental as to be revoked at will—their bodies inseparable from their capacity to suffer, and bear it smiling."

"Addict—that word meant something different when applied to him...for those who looked like (him), that word was a moral failure, a confirmation of society’s worst fears. A forfeit of all the tenuous advantages given."

Phenomenal author Rob Franklin left me stunned with his exceptionally brilliantly written debut novel, Great Black Hope. I'm speechless that his first book reads like the final masterpiece of a renowned writer.

Smith's world changes as the, "...night splits open along its tight-stitched seam." Arrested for cocaine possession while partying in the Hamptons, and already a disappointment to his privileged family as a queer black man living in NYC, not sure of his future plans, his arrest will only assure them they are right about him.

But the arrest might be a necessary evil for Smith to come to terms that while "his class privilege may protect him, his race will not." His roommate Elle is murdered and he didn't even know she wasn't home. When he learns some disturbing facts about Elle and is asked, “How well did you know your friend...," he is dumbfounded realizing he didn't know her because he never tried to... never asked her...about her.

Versatile voice actor Justice Smith is a masterful storyteller with his emotional tones making this third person character driven contemporary literary fiction feel like a poignant significant memoir.

This writer is the future, the great hope of the literary world and deserves your attention.

i received free copies of this book/audiobook from the publishers via #NetGalley for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the digital ARC in exchange for an honest review. This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year and it fell somewhat flat thanks to inflated expectations. This is definitely a promising debut and I will read more from this author, but the plot and character development fell somewhat flat for me. I expected the book to proceed as a mystery like it started, but it morphed much into a character study with a character I didn't feel super connected to. The plot and characters felt disconnected and made it hard to buy in emotionally to either. There was some beautiful writing in this though which gives it a solid 3 stars!! I would love to read more of this writers' work when it's a bit more mature. 3/5 stars!

I appreciated the inclusion of culturally resonant themes and moments that explored the weight of identity. However, the story lacked forward motion, and I found myself consistently disengaged.

The character of Smith, while clearly meant to be a complex and internalized lead, didn’t resonate with me. I wanted to connect with him, but the narrative would pull away before any depth could fully land.

This may appeal more to readers who prefer introspective literary fiction with minimal plot, but I found it difficult to stay invested. The tone and pacing ultimately left me feeling unsatisfied.

This is perfect summer reading. It's tense, gripping, and laugh out loud funny at times and moves you deeply the next. Franklin is doing so much here, but it never reads that way. It does read as truly singular.