Voices Of The South

The Rumpus interviews Ta-Nehisi about his upcoming novel, which is set in Virginia before the civil war:

[M]y aim is to answer a simple question–How might it have felt to be a Southerner before/during/immediately after the Civil War? My way of answering that question is through the language of the time, is through attempting to hear the voices, and phrasing of that period and pull something out of it that will allow me to understand that world. As it stands, the story is about an interracial family in Virginia. It’s told from the perspective of four different voices in that family. I don’t know if it will make a very good novel. But I’m confident it will answer my questions about the times.