"A timely and useful book, and the logical starting place for future students of Afro-American fiction."-- Journal of Modern Literature "Displaying a formidable range of reference, Bell examines more than 150 novels by one hundred novelists. [His book] is clearly a masterful study. It sets the standard that future critics will be obliged to meet, and establishes analytical terms and relationships that others will have to engage, challenge, and expand upon."-- American Quarterly "If I had to recommend just one book about Afro-American literature, Bernard W. Bell's The Afro-American Novel and Its Tradition would be that book. There is no doubt that this is 'the book' on its specific subject."-- Studies in the Humanities "Drawing cogently on recent development in literary theory, Bell views black fiction as a socially symbolic act encoding the survival strategies that have developed out of the Afro-American experience of double consciousness.

A necessary volume for students of black fiction on all levels."-- Choice "A significant contribution to the field of Afro-American studies . [that] deserves a place on the shelves not only of those scholars and teachers specifically concerned with the black American novel, but also of those interested in the history and development of the novel as the most characteristic and popular literary genre in our time."-- Modern Fiction Studies "Bell skillfully intermingles the political and artistic dimensions of Afro-American literature in a way that is at once revealing and definitional. Because Bell keeps his study open to competing versions of reality and differing critical approaches, The Afro-American Novel and Its Tradition us likely to be a a central and formative book in the field of Afro-American literary criticism."-- Georgia Review.