Black Hornet was published by Carroll & Graf in 1994, and it is the most explicitly political of the Lew Griffin novels. Set primarily in the 1960s (though with characteristic temporal shifts to other periods), the novel follows a young Griffin during the civil rights era in New Orleans, investigating a series of sniper attacks on civil rights workers and white liberals.
Sallis uses the 1960s setting to explore the particular position of the Black detective figure during a period when the relationship between Black communities and the law was even more fraught than usual. Griffin cannot simply “investigate” — his very presence in certain spaces (white neighborhoods, police stations, courtrooms) is politically charged. His detective work is inseparable from his identity as a Black man in the segregated South.
The novel also functions as a meditation on political violence: who shoots, and why? What is the relationship between individual acts of violence and systemic oppression? Can violence against an oppressive system be distinguished from random criminality? Sallis refuses easy answers — the sniper’s motivations remain partially opaque, and the novel does not endorse violence even as it understands the rage that produces it.
Collecting Black Hornet
First edition (Carroll & Graf, New York, 1994): Cloth binding, dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition in dust jacket: $25–$60
- Without jacket: $5–$15