A novel by Jason Orr · October 6, 2026
ENLIGHTENMENT
The Life and Erasure of Granville T. Woods
Granville T. Woods can hear a machine failing before anyone else knows there is a problem. What he cannot yet hear is the cost of demanding the same endurance from everyone beside him.
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The story
Born into a nation rebuilding itself after slavery, Granville leaves school for the machine shop at ten and teaches himself engineering through railroads, furnaces, telegraph lines and relentless experiment. His inventions promise to let moving trains speak across open track and to carry electrical power more safely through growing cities. They also draw him into a ruthless contest of patents, money and reputation, one in which famous names arrive with armies of lawyers and independent genius must finance its own defense.
At his side, his brother Lyates postpones inventions of his own, while Clara Bishop lends her precise hand to Granville's claims and fights to keep her life from becoming another uncredited page in his archive.
To change America, Granville must make the world recognize his work. To preserve what he loves, he must recognize the work — and the people — already holding him up.
One story · every way in
The formats
Paperback & eBook
The novel
ISBN 979-8-9861766-3-5
Audiobook
Narrated by Winston Hale
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Original score · out now
The Current
A cinematic, jazzy companion to the novel: invention, struggle, memory and legacy.
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The single
Can You Hear Me Now
Düla
Scan to listen to The Current, the soundtrack to the novel, or open it on Spotify.
Plates · Fig. 0 – Fig. 30
The book, in figures
Every chapter opens with an engraved plate, drawn like a patent figure. Hover or tap to see its title.
FIG. 0Sankofa
FIG. 1The Unmarked Grave
FIG. 2The Scalpel
FIG. 3The Ground Wire
FIG. 4Boy in the Machine Shop
FIG. 5The Empire Doesn’t Knock
FIG. 6The Forge Road
FIG. 7Ink
FIG. 8The Gentleman’s Purchase
FIG. 9The Wire That Speaks
FIG. 10Room for One
FIG. 11A Marriage of Compromise
FIG. 12The Great Blizzard
FIG. 13The Underground
FIG. 14The Archivist
FIG. 15The New Man
FIG. 16Two Wins
FIG. 17Coney Island
FIG. 18The Libel Trial
FIG. 19What Silas Carries
FIG. 20The Echo
FIG. 21The Offer
FIG. 22The Empty House
FIG. 23The Letters She Keeps
FIG. 24General Electric, 1901
FIG. 25The Hands Slow
FIG. 26Martha
FIG. 27January 30, 1910
FIG. 28The Uncredited Funeral
FIG. 29The Unopened Letter
FIG. 30The Textbook