Supersonic
Multi-generational novel that explores the layered history of a Seattle neighborhood through the lives of the people who built, reshaped, and fought for it across centuries.
A Multi-Generational Epic of a Changing Seattle Neighborhood
Supersonic by Thomas Kohnstamm is a sweeping, multi-generational novel that explores the layered history of a Seattle neighborhood through the lives of the people who built, reshaped, and fought for it across centuries. The story is set into motion when Sami Hasegawa-Stalworth, a determined PTA president, proposes renaming a local elementary school after her late grandmother—a revered music educator and a survivor of Japanese American incarceration during World War II. What begins as a seemingly simple gesture of remembrance quickly escalates into a contentious debate over legacy, gentrification, and whose stories deserve to be remembered.
From this flashpoint, the novel unfolds in a kaleidoscopic narrative that spans eras and perspectives, tracing the interwoven destinies of families and outsiders who have called this hilltop corner of Seattle home. Kohnstamm deftly navigates through time—from the first arrival of white settlers and the tragic displacement of the region’s last Indigenous landholders, to a PTA fundraising auction in the present day.
The novel introduces a vivid cast of characters: an opioid-dependent 19th-century con man turned self-proclaimed city builder; a disgraced Navy mechanic who dreams of constructing a supersonic jet; a modern-day stay-at-home dad navigating the legal marijuana industry; and Sami’s grandmother, whose passion for music transformed a school and helped shape a generation.
As the story hurtles through the seismic changes brought on by the Yukon Gold Rush, the military-industrial boom of the jet age, and the disruptive rise of Big Tech, Supersonic offers a resonant meditation on the cycles of ambition, loss, and reinvention. It’s a novel about the soul of a city, examining how identities are forged and fractured across time, and how communities survive—even thrive—through contradiction and change.
With wit, compassion, and a keen sense of place, Supersonic reveals the tumultuous history beneath Seattle’s progressive surface, delivering a richly textured portrait of America in perpetual transformation.
