From the author of Man Gone Down—a New York Times Top Ten Book of the Year and winner of the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award—comes a deeply personal memoir of race, trauma, alcoholism, parenting, mental illness and ultimately hope in a portrait of three generations of Black American men

In 2007, Michael Thomas launched into the literary world with his award-winning first novel Man Gone Down, a beautiful and devastating story of a Black father trying to claim a piece of the American Dream. Called “powerful and moving . . . an impressive success,” by Kaiama L. Glover on the cover of the New York Times Book Review, Thomas’ debut introduced a writer of prodigious and rare talent. In his long-awaited encore and first work of nonfiction, The Broken King, Thomas explores fathers and sons, lovers and the beloved, trauma and recovery, success and failure in a unique, urgent, and timeless memoir.

The title is borrowed from T.S. Eliot’s line in “Little Gidding”: “If you came at night like a broken king,” and the work ponders the process of being broken. Akin to Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time or Nabokov’s Speak, Memory, Thomas’ memoir unfolds through six powerful, interlocking and overlaying sections focusing on the lives of five men: his father—a philosopher, Boston Red Sox fan, and absent parent; his estranged older brother; his two sons growing up in Brooklyn; and always, heartbreakingly himself. At the center of The Broken King is the story of Thomas’ own breakdown, a result of inherited family history and his own experiences, from growing up Black in the Boston suburbs to publishing a prize-winning novel with “the house of Beckett.”

Every page of The Broken King rings with the impact of America’s sweeping struggle with race and class, education and family, and builds to a brave, meticulous articulation of a creative mind’s journey into and out of madness.

BIO

Michael Thomas is the author of the national bestseller Man Gone Down, winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and a New York Times Top Ten Novel of the Year. His writing has appeared in A Public Space, The New York Times, and in Ben George’s anthology The Book of Dads. He is a professor of English at Hunter College. He lives in Brooklyn.

REVIEWS

“A prize-winning writer’s anguish . . . Thomas believes that one way to keep “from falling into darkness” is to try “to make something beautiful.” This book hits the mark . . . A powerful memoir of childhood trauma, literary success, and mental illness.” -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Absorbing . . . Intimate . . . Grappling with his own addictions, mental illness, and past trauma, all while aspiring to be a wholly present husband, father, brother, and son, [Thomas] details his life from growing up in the Boston suburbs through his young fatherhood and finding his path as a Black man in America. Thomas is a captivating writer, infusing his passages with turns of phrase and language that are at once powerful and delicate, always encompassing the complexity of Black fatherhood and elegantly dissecting the consequences of societal pressure. For fans of Clint Smith and Ta-Nehisi Coates.” -- Allison Escoto, Booklist (starred review)

“Michael Thomas has written a truly extraordinary memoir, one that sears and sings with such terrible, beautiful honesty it will burn its way deep into your bones. The Broken King is a book for now, but feels like it’s always been part of the world in the way only great literature does. This hardscrabble lyric masterpiece is funny and brutal, soaring and chthonic. A triumph, and reading it will leave you changed. It’s genuinely one of the most extraordinary and magical books I have ever read. I’m full of awe.” -- Helen Macdonald, New York Times bestselling author of H Is for Hawk

[H]  Grove Press  /  August 05, 2025

 1.7" H x 9.0" L x 5.9" W (1.35 lbs) 416 pages