I Am Not Sidney Poitier Audiobook By Percival Everett cover art

I Am Not Sidney Poitier

A Novel

 Preview

Audible Standard 30-day free trial

Try Standard free
Select 1 audiobook a month from our entire collection of titles.
Yours as long as you’re a member.
Get unlimited access to bingeable podcasts.
Standard auto renews for $8.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

I Am Not Sidney Poitier

By: Percival Everett
Narrated by: Amir Abdullah
Try Standard free

$8.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $18.06

Buy for $18.06

I Am Not Sidney Poitier is an irresistible comic novel from the master storyteller Percival Everett

I was, in life, to be a gambler, a risk-taker, a swashbuckler, a knight. I accepted, then and there, my place in the world. I was a fighter of windmills. I was a chaser of whales. I was Not Sidney Poitier.

Not Sidney Poitier is an amiable young man in an absurd country. The sudden death of his mother orphans him at age eleven, leaving him with an unfortunate name, an uncanny resemblance to the famous actor, and, perhaps more fortunate, a staggering number of shares in the Turner Broadcasting Corporation.

Percival Everett's hilarious new novel follows Not Sidney's tumultuous life, as the social hierarchy scrambles to balance his skin color with his fabulous wealth. Maturing under the less-than watchful eye of his adopted foster father, Ted Turner, Not gets arrested in rural Georgia for driving while black, sparks a dinner table explosion at the home of his manipulative girlfriend, and sleuths a murder case in Smut Eye, Alabama, all while navigating the recurrent communication problem: "What's your name?" a kid would ask. "Not Sidney," I would say. "Okay, then what is it?"

©2009 Percival Everett (P)2023 Tantor Literature & Fiction African American Funny Satire Comedy Witty Fostering
Humorous Storytelling • Clever Wordplay • Excellent Narration • Bizarre Twists • Compelling Storyline • Fine Pacing

Highly rated for:

All stars
Most relevant
Such clever satire. I truly enjoyed it. The narration was excellent. Made me laugh out loud several times!

Hilarious!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Not his best and not what the other reviews called funny. Pretty loose storyline that made little sense and the attempt to tie it together at the end didn’t work. Everett is a good but not great. The Trees and Erasure are the best he’s done. And they are good. James is weird and not sure why it gets so much play other than it’s associated with Huck Finn. My guess if anyone but a black writer wrote it, it would be panned big time.
As far as I’m Not Sidney Poitier— meh.

Meh

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I read this and felt like the author was either brilliant or on drugs weird stream of consciousness weird collection of stories that made no sense
did laugh at loud at the the thanksgiving dinner
the rest was dazed and confused
questioning what people consider art

weird weird

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I like this author. I listened to “James” and I was hooked. So I tried “not Sidney” and I wasn’t disappointed.

The title says it all

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Everett delivers an outstanding novel with skillful humor woven around characters and events of the mid-twentieth century in the South.

Clever, humerous story skillfully narrated

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews