Bestselling author Jason Hill brings the streets of Chicago to life in a powerful and utterly unforgettable fifth novel, Icarus in Increments: A Novel, through the eyes of his narrator, the author J. Stone. Raised in a small suburb, J. Stone is the formerly rich author of a series of books that were bestsellers in their time, a collection of erotic novels often derided as "mommy porn." Still, they'd sold well enough in their time to make him one of the most prominent black authors in his heyday, along with a Gold Coast high-rise apartment and the obligatory white girlfriend to boot. Until the day his drug debts and careless living catch up to him. Going on the run from a dangerous dealer, he returns to his hometown, where he hopes to win back the heart of a girlfriend from his early days, before he was successful, but there's only one catch: she's about to marry another man. Quick-witted, sexy, and urban-minded, J.

Stone is a character who will stay in your mind, an intelligent African-American novel for our times, yet also universal, Icarus in Increments examines the many subtle facets of the black experience through the eyes of a black man who straddles both worlds, book smart and street smart, a man accustomed to talking in ways which are unnatural, out of a primal need for self-preservation in streets where the weak don't live and who, in the end, must find a way to conquer the enemies without and within, while finding love in the process.