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Defiant Acts: A Novel
Drawing on the author’s experiences, this debut novel follows an interracial blended family living in Chicago in the 1990s.
James Stewart III’s powerful debut novel documents the life of a working-class interracial couple and their children in a Chicago suburb in the early 1990s. The father, Jim, is a Black man married to Connie, a white woman with two white sons from a previous marriage. Connie and Jim have three more children together, and the entire family lives in a cramped two-bedroom apartment in a well-to-do, predominantly white community.
Defiant Acts follows the Stewarts through a year in which Jim fights to earn a promotion, the adolescent boys struggle to find themselves, one of the younger children becomes gravely ill, and the parents try to stay afloat in a shaky economy. Within the walls of the Stewarts’ home, race doesn’t factor, but when the family interacts with the outside world, it is inescapable, a basis for identity and inclusion as well as a spur for exclusion and abuse.
Rooted in the tradition of Black authors from Chicago and drawing on the author’s own experiences, Defiant Acts eschews a conventional plot, presenting a series of captured moments—past and present—and multiple perspectives to build a mosaic of the family’s lives. In clear, concise prose, Stewart focuses on the complexities of human relationships and on race relations both in and outside the domestic space, placing emphasis on the values that bind this tight-knit family solidarity, care, and hope.
James Stewart III’s powerful debut novel documents the life of a working-class interracial couple and their children in a Chicago suburb in the early 1990s. The father, Jim, is a Black man married to Connie, a white woman with two white sons from a previous marriage. Connie and Jim have three more children together, and the entire family lives in a cramped two-bedroom apartment in a well-to-do, predominantly white community.
Defiant Acts follows the Stewarts through a year in which Jim fights to earn a promotion, the adolescent boys struggle to find themselves, one of the younger children becomes gravely ill, and the parents try to stay afloat in a shaky economy. Within the walls of the Stewarts’ home, race doesn’t factor, but when the family interacts with the outside world, it is inescapable, a basis for identity and inclusion as well as a spur for exclusion and abuse.
Rooted in the tradition of Black authors from Chicago and drawing on the author’s own experiences, Defiant Acts eschews a conventional plot, presenting a series of captured moments—past and present—and multiple perspectives to build a mosaic of the family’s lives. In clear, concise prose, Stewart focuses on the complexities of human relationships and on race relations both in and outside the domestic space, placing emphasis on the values that bind this tight-knit family solidarity, care, and hope.
192 pages, Paperback
Published May 17, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 5, 2025
Jim… was plain angry and shocked his damn self, because Black folks’ capacity for despair is only matched by their capacity for hope.”
I was lucky enough to attend Stewart’s book release party for DEFIANT ACTS a few weeks ago as a plus one of a friend. I was excited about it enough to request a copy of the book from the publisher to read beforehand. I was told by my friend, Kara, that one could really hear the author’s voice in the writing. After meeting him and listening to him speak - I agree. Stewart’s voice is very clear in the stories he is telling.
And for a book such as this, voice is incredibly important. DEFIANT ACTS is a telling of stories, but also so much more than that at the same time. It is a time capsule, preserving aspects of time and space for generations of a multiracial family fighting to thrive in an often unforgiving societal structure.
And through it all, we hear James. Every telling emotive and complex - the author invites readers to experience this history through accounts of characters from their own perspectives and feelings. These are moments of fear, courage, distress, joy, disappointment, hope, pain. And love. ALWAYS love.
Reading DEFIANT ACTS was meaningful to me, and I am happy to have read it. I recommend you do, as well.
My thanks to James Stewart III and Acre Books for the copy.
I was lucky enough to attend Stewart’s book release party for DEFIANT ACTS a few weeks ago as a plus one of a friend. I was excited about it enough to request a copy of the book from the publisher to read beforehand. I was told by my friend, Kara, that one could really hear the author’s voice in the writing. After meeting him and listening to him speak - I agree. Stewart’s voice is very clear in the stories he is telling.
And for a book such as this, voice is incredibly important. DEFIANT ACTS is a telling of stories, but also so much more than that at the same time. It is a time capsule, preserving aspects of time and space for generations of a multiracial family fighting to thrive in an often unforgiving societal structure.
And through it all, we hear James. Every telling emotive and complex - the author invites readers to experience this history through accounts of characters from their own perspectives and feelings. These are moments of fear, courage, distress, joy, disappointment, hope, pain. And love. ALWAYS love.
Reading DEFIANT ACTS was meaningful to me, and I am happy to have read it. I recommend you do, as well.
My thanks to James Stewart III and Acre Books for the copy.
March 6, 2025
90s Chicago and an irresistible working class family. I absolutely loved this book.
September 29, 2025
A captivating insight into the life of a patchwork family, interweaving themes of race and financial struggle with beautiful moments of grace. My only critic is that the ending was too abrupt to my liking, withholding the happy ending I so desperately hoped for.
March 4, 2026
Infused by the author. I know the family and he talks of Naperville, but reference a teacher who worked in Aurora. The family is the nicest family you will ever meet. I never knew the hardships they went through.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews