COURTNEY
MCLEAN THOMPSON
WHY THIS BOOK. WHY NOW ?
ABOUT
NOBODY WANTS TO REMEMBER
After a summer in New York City, seventeen-year-old Kackie Aiken, a feisty redhead from a blueblood Southern family, believes she’s outgrown her small town and its small minds. When she returns home and is partnered for a project about the Civil Rights Movement with Walt Singletary, a new Black student at her primarily white prep school, she’s forced to confront her family’s dark history amidst intensifying hostility in the classroom.
Set against the backdrop of historic Mandeville, South Carolina’s tricentennial celebration—and under the menacing gaze of Mayor Tommy Cooper—Kackie and Walt face relentless opposition as they seek out the truth and discover one another in the process. Can they resurrect the ghosts of the past without being destroyed by them?
Nobody Wants to Rememberis a soulful and heartbreaking coming-of-age story about confession and repentance, even when they cost what you most hold dear—and about how, especially for Kackie and Walt, the truth may not always set you free.
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Early Praise
“I loved this book. I couldn’t put it down, and when I did, I couldn’t wait to pick it back up. Since the book was in a familiar setting and the characters were so well written, I was able to vividly imagine every scene. I would recommend this book to any YA reader. It is a great representation of how high schoolers handle these intense situations, and then makes the reader realize how they should handle that in real life. Readers will have found a book that shows them that it’s not enough to just be not racist, but that they have to be anti-racist.”
— Audrey, high school student
“I have laughed out loud, wept like a baby, searched my heart, soul, and mind of all the known and unknown prejudices I have, thought about forgiveness and restoration in such life-giving ways, considered consequences both short and long-term of our lives and on and on . . . I am filled up and exhausted and ready for book #2!”
— Ellen, college student
“This is a work full of humanity, honesty, and beauty that is sure to open up new imaginative possibilities for those who are longing to break through our stubborn racial gridlock. The character development invites self-awareness, the mood is appropriately haunting, and the themes compel the reader to reckon with the original wound of American life. Not only does the book ring true, but Thompson also manages to creatively explore the issue of race without a hint of self-righteousness that so often derails contemporary racial discourse. In these pages, we not only find a gripping reminder of our great need for social repair, but also the rich rewards that await those who take up this work.”
— Russ, pastor and entrepreneur
Meet Courtney
Courtney McLean Thompson spent the last decade in a town you won’t find on a map and befriending people who aren’t in the public record.
She listened to them, learned from them, grieved and hoped with them, and wrote their story in her debut novel, Nobody Wants to Remember.
Courtney began writing as an act of protest to showcase the systemic and abiding wounds of our common life while also casting a vision for how we might heal the communities we share.
When she isn’t writing, Courtney (along with her husband) can be found in Virginia raising four real characters and daydreaming about her fictional ones.
She holds degrees in Journalism and Theology.