Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead

Published by Doubleday on July 18, 2023

Crook Manifesto is a sequel to Harlem Shuffle. The combined novels tell the story of Ray Carney, but in doing so they tell the story of Harlem. While Crook Manifesto takes the form of three solid crime stories — they often read like literary thrillers — the two books combine to trace changes in culture, race relations, and urban politics in the latter half of the twentieth century. It is also a story of resilience and fortitude, showcased in one character but present in an entire community, an entire race.

Carney’s father was killed by the police while committing a robbery. Carney both followed in his father’s footsteps by turning to crime when he needed cash and surpassed his father by getting a business degree and opening his own furniture store. The business allowed him to prosper, but during desperate times he paid the bills by developing a side business as a fence. That criminal career drives the plot in Harlem Shuffle.

By the end of Harlem Shuffle and at the beginning of Crook Manifesto, Carney thinks he has gone straight. He misses the excitement or glamor of fencing stolen property, but he has a family to raise and doesn’t miss the risk of imprisonment. Unfortunately, a return to crime is inevitable. “Crooked stays crooked.”

The first of three criminal episodes involves a bent cop named Munson. Like all New York cops, Munson has been shaking down criminals and legitimate businesses (including Carney’s). The police are out of sorts because the Black Liberation Army is committing crimes to raise cash and may have killed a cop. Munson tries to frame the BLA when he commits a serious theft from an underworld boss. The scheme goes sideways when Munson tries to screw his partner out of the partner’s share. He wants Carney to fence some hot jewelry because Carney’s no longer in the business and will not be an immediate suspect. Carney becomes Munson’s de facto partner in a criminal escapade that puts them both at risk. Carney doubts that Munson will allow him to live when the day comes to an end.

The second part takes its theme from the blaxploitation movies that were popular in the 1970s. A Harlem filmmaker wants to make a movie featuring a black actress who has had small roles in Hollywood movies. She’ll be a “black lady secret agent in the cracker-killing business.” The filmmaker is shooting a scene in Carney’s store and has hired Carney’s friend Pepper to provide security. When the actress disappears, Pepper goes on a Harlem adventure to find her, eventually tangling with one of the underworld bosses.

The novel’s last act takes place at the intersection of arson and political corruption. The media blame black activists for fires in Harlem that are actually caused by poor wiring or arson-for-profit schemes. A Harlem politician is behind many of the schemes. Tenements burn down, the owners cash in on insurance, the city acquires the deeds, the property gets sold for redevelopment, and various politicians and bureaucrats get a slice of the profits. When a boy is hospitalized in one of the fires, Carney decides to find out who is responsible. He hires Pepper to help him investigate. Both men pay a price for noticing entrenched corruption.

All three stories are classic crime dramas, complete with fistfights, death threats, and an occasional chase scene. Without slowing the action, Whitehead tells a bigger story about race and changing times in Harlem. It is a story of violent cops, political corruption, entrenched racism, and accepted sexism (particularly concerning black women). Yet Whitehead doesn’t beat the reader over the head with polemic. Carney is something of an everyman (or more specifically, an every black man) who faces the same family and business issues as everyone else who strives for success, but takes it as a given, hardly worth noticing, that he must overcome additional barriers because of his race.

Carney uses music (a Jackson 5 concert), movies (Superfly), black standup comedians (edgier than Bill Cosby), and headlines (Vietnam, white fear of a race war) to take the reader back in time. They also set the scene for Carney’s journey. He realizes that kids hear songs of heartbreak at a young age to prepare them for the reality of adult life. “You sing the sad songs first, then you act them out.” He understands that black entertainers are looking for a way out of lives that offer fewer opportunities than white people expect. Expressions that are popular in the 1970s add to the atmosphere. Pepper likes the phrase “getting over” as an expression of black people finding “a way to outwit white people’s rules.”

Pepper has lived a rougher life than Carney, although Carney and his wife have reserved a room for “Uncle Pepper” in their home. Pepper grew up wondering what it would be like to live in a home like Carney’s. He values the acceptance he feels in Carney’s home, but he never feels entirely comfortable. His is a life of the street, albeit a life that is governed by a moral code. Pepper is a powerful character and an interesting contrast to Carney.

The book highlights changes in society that are reflected in Harlem. The city is burning, “not because of sick men with matches and cans of gas but because the city itself was sick, waiting for fire, begging for it.” Thanks to arson, urban renewal is gentrifying the neighborhoods. Bars that cater to criminals are harder to find. “They are dying off, the old crooks and hustlers and flimflam artists, or upstate after an ill-advised scheme to cover medical bills or six months’ back rent or new teeth.” The city is breaking down. Blue collar jobs are gone and white collar jobs are reserved for white skin. “The blacks and Puerto Ricans are squeezed into smaller and smaller ghettos that were once thriving neighborhoods.”

Still, by the third story, Carney has made a comparatively good life for himself. He belongs to a Harlem social club and associates with high rollers, although he no longer remembers why he wanted to keep their company. When he faces another catastrophe, he takes it is stride because catastrophe is all he can expect from life. He might still find a way to get over.

Resilience is the book’s overriding theme. Black men came to New York from Alabama because in Harlem, they could be men. Black musicians are “beat down, their skulls full of dead-end thoughts,” but “they keep playing.” Carney won’t stop striving until he’s dead. “The city tried to break him. It didn’t work. He was genuine Manhattan schist and that don’t break easy.” The story is inspirational in its message that endurance is a way to win a battle, that progress may be incremental but it can never be stopped.

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