Overview

Davyon, exiled to Denver after a fight with his abusive father, has a basketball jones. Tryouts at Jackson High are six weeks away, but the competition is tough. So is Church, the closeted ex-pro whose toxic manner is triggering but whose talent is undeniable. Davyon hopes the OG will coach him into shape, but Church isn't interested-at least, not until Davyon squares up with Tyree, a homophobic hoop phenom and the one person standing in his way.

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Reviews

""The magic and power of Vince Omni's pen lies in his masterful conjuring of an era, a place, a people, with specificity and the most intimate of details. Here, Omni takes us back (or introduces us anew) to a moment both different from and similar to our current one, across the fraught terrain of family and community, grappling with longing, regret, forgiveness, and all the complexities of loving, caring for, and failing one another. Omni's characters speak whole worlds of truth in a single line. At turns cool, breathtaking, and heartbreaking, 1989 packs the best kind of emotional punch, unsentimental and unforgettable."" -Deesha Philyaw, author of The Secret Lives of Church Ladies ""Filled with narrative fast-breaks and winning shots, Omni offers readers a slender but rounded world. Here, through half-spoken memories, the quiet interiority of a nostalgic protagonist clashes and contextualizes major events and shifts in our modern culture. 1989 has something to teach us about the fragility of identity, the scars left by absence, and the strange hope we can find in reclamation."" -Donald E. Quist, creator of Past Ten and author of For Other Ghosts ""The work of Vince Omni delivers the feeling that drives every action, every act of love, and every move on the court. He shows the emotional choreography and improvisation that help the reader see, feel, and inhabit the world on these pages. Time moves as fluidly as the language, taking the story through history, basketball, pop culture, and the urgent immediacy of the times the characters navigate."" -Ravi Howard, author of Like Trees, Walking and Driving the King ""With a searing and controlled voice, our soulful narrator takes us on a powerful and moving journey of grace-grace given and grace denied. This one will leave your heart tender for days. Omni has proven himself a consummate writer. I look forward to seeing him rise."" -Esther Ifesinachi Okonkwo, author of The Tiny Things are Heavier

Author Information

VINCE OMNI is author of 1989, winner of the CRAFT 2025 Novelette Print Prize. Other awards include a PEN/Dau Short Story Prize, the Jesmyn Ward Prize in Fiction, and the Margaret Walker Memorial Prize in Creative Writing. His writing has appeared in the Michigan Quarterly Review and will be featured this year in Virgin Islands Noir and The Best Debut Short Stories 2025. Vince holds an MFA from the University of Kansas and a PhD from Florida State University, where he was a McKnight Doctoral Fellow. He teaches African American literature and creative writing at Lake Forest College and is cofounder of SoulClap: A Black Joy Journal.

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