Conversation with Dennard Dayle, a Jamaican American humorist and fiction writer whose work appears frequently in The New Yorker. His first novel is How to Dodge a Cannonball (2025), a razor-sharp satire that dives into the heart of the Civil War.

The novel follows the misadventures of a young white idealist who ultimately joins an all-Black Union regiment full of strange characters, including a science-fiction playwright, a Haitian double agent, and a former slave feuding with God.

Gary Shteyngart said, “I can’t think of a wittier, more hilarious or more relevant young writer. How to Dodge a Cannonball is the great Civil War novel I didn’t know I needed.”

Dennard Dayle
Conversation / Q&A
University at Albany
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
1400 Washington Avenue Albany NY 12222
Free and open to the public
Books will be sold following the conversation

Cosponsored by the English Department’s Creative Writing Program and Young Writers Project, UAlbany’s Writing & Critical Inquiry Program (WCI), and the Honors College.