The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr

A singular and stunning debut novel about the forbidden union between two enslaved young men on a Deep South plantation, the refuge they find in each other, and a betrayal that threatens their existence.
 
Isaiah was Samuel's and Samuel was Isaiah's. That was the way it was since the beginning, and the way it was to be until the end.  In the barn they tended to the animals, but also to each other, transforming the hollowed-out shed into a place of human refuge, a source of intimacy and hope in a world ruled by vicious masters.
 
But when a fellow slave seeks to gain favour by preaching the master's gospel on the plantation, the slaves being to turn on their own.  Isaiah and Samuel's love, which was once so simple, is seen as sinful and a clear danger to the plantation's harmony.
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‘Rarely is a book this finely wrought, the lives and histories it holds so tenderly felt, and rendered unforgettably true’ Ocean Vuong, author of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous