Everyone should go check on their favorite authors because it seems a lot of them are either in their bag or trying to secure it.
I mean seriously, this week alone, we have authors depicting students selling their skin for food processing and Rick Ross teaching readers how to boss up. I mean, sure, we’re all wondering who Rick’s target audience with this book is, but they exist anyway—and to be perfectly honest, I’d check in on them as well.
The authors from last week were a whole mood—in the sense of, “summer is over, here are some moody fall reads as you transition out of the warm weather and sunshine.” But this week, the authors come in and *bam!* drop a bombshell of literary trauma on readers with absolutely no apology.
Nor should they be apologetic.
George M. Johnson’s second memoir, We Are Not Broken is the alternately heartwarming and heart-wrenching story of the 2020 The Root 100 honoree and their three brotherly cousins, fiercely loving grandmother and George’s coming to terms with their gender identity. Recently excerpted by The Root, it’s the perfect prequel to Johnson’s bestselling debut, All Boys Aren’t Blue. Chasing Me to My Grave: An Artist’s Memoir of the Jim Crow South by Winfred Rembert follows his story as a teenager in the Civil Rights Movement, his escape from near-lynching and how turning to art in his fifties has helped him cope with trauma.
Don’t worry, there are fictional trauma surprises up some authors’ sleeves, too. Remember when New Rochelle was frantically sanitizing office buildings and rapidly shutting things down in the beginning of 2020? Well, Geth remembers, as her character dealt with being a senior in high school in the first New York town COVID raged through in Zero O’Clock by Christopher John Farley. And as mentioned above, another bunch of angst-ridden teenagers begin harvesting their own excess skin for food processing for some extra cash in Venita Blackburn’s, How to Wrestle a Girl: Stories.
I’m here for the existential drama and trauma that authors bring to the table each week, especially this week. It shows how important and how effective a tool writing is for working through things and finding a group of people who are supportive.
Chasing Me to My Grave: An Artist’s Memoir of the Jim Crow South – Winfred Rembert (Memoir)
Winfred Rembert was born into a family of Georgia laborers, joined the Civil Rights Movement as a teenager, was arrested while fleeing a demonstration, survived a near lynching and spent seven years on chain gangs. It was there he met his soon-to-be wife Patsy, who encouraged him to start drawing and painting scenes from his youth using “leather tooling skills he learned in prison.” His work paid tribute to his hometown and upbringing and his writing solidifies the love and respect he had for the people who raised him.
“Vivid, confrontational, revelatory, and complex, Chasing Me to My Grave is a searing memoir in prose and painted leather that celebrates Black life and summons readers to confront painful and urgent realities at the heart of American history and society.”
September 7, 2021, Bloomsbury Press
Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America – R. Eric Thomas (Essays)
R. Eric Thomas didn’t think he was different until everyone started telling him he was. From his mostly white, mostly rich high school to his all-Black church to the Ivy League school he hoped to escape to, someone was always telling him he was different. Here for It looks at what it means to be different through the eyes of others. He writes about his struggles with reconciling his Christianity after coming out, the “exhaustion of code-switching” accidentally going viral for the wrong reasons and more. In the end, Thomas seeks to answer this question: Is the future worth it? And why do we bother trying to change it?
September 7, 2021, Ballantine Books
How to Wrestle a Girl: Stories – Venita Blackburn (Fiction)
Set in Southern California, Venita Blackburn’s characters spend more time moping and spitting and being angry than anything else. Divided into different stories and vignettes, How to Wrestle a Girl follows a teenage girl still reeling in the aftermath of her father’s death and her tricky attraction to her best friend. She tries to feel normal—participating in wrestling, softball, going to church with her arguably too-complicated family and absolutely crushing boys in arm wrestling. But even within all of those distractions, she is forced to acknowledge her sexuality and the ways she’s changing. Other story titles are “Biology Class,” where a teacher is tormented to insanity and “Black Bear Harvest,” which follows a collection of kids who plan to sell their excess fat and skin for food processing…
September 7, 2021, Macmillan
Misfits: A Personal Manifesto – Michaela Coel (Nonfiction)
Emmy-nominated actress-creator Michaela Coel delivered a speech at the Edinburgh International Television that not only changed the lives of the viewers and listeners but changed her life, as well. Her most striking realizations about herself came from this speech, and Misfits “immerses readers in her vision through powerful allegory and deeply personal anecdotes.” From her upbringing in London’s public housing to her escape to the theatre and how that love of acting has evolved over the last few years, Coel publishes her manifesto as a way to both empower and open the eyes of her readers.
September 7, 2021, Henry Hold and Co.
Say It Loud!: On Race, Law, History, and Culture – Randall Kennedy (Nonfiction)
Say It Loud! is a collection of essays by prominent, academic and up-and-coming writers who have all experienced racial oppression at one point or another. In each essay, Kennedy is careful to maintain the complex thoughts and feelings the authors present yet ensure each piece has a way of being “stirring and enlightening.”
September 7, 2021, Penguin Random House
The Perfect Day to Boss Up: A Hustler’s Guide to Building Your Empire – Rick Ross (Nonfiction)
Rick Ross’s new book, The Perfect Day to Boss Up shows readers a different side to the legendary rapper. His path to success hasn’t always been easy—in fact, it has been wrought with more setbacks than many people know. The book is both a guide to success as well as a biographical account of his life. Some topics include: how to turn ambition into action, managing and investing money, why failure is central to success, secrets to handling stressful situations and how to build a perfect team.
“It doesn’t matter what’s going on. Even the most dire situation is just another opportunity to boss up.” – Rick Ross
September 7, 2021, Hanover Square Press
Unfollow Me: Essays on Complicity – Jill Louise Busby (Essays)
What does one do when they are fed up with the lack of real diversity and inclusion efforts in the workplace? Well, they upload a one-minute video to social media and watch it skyrocket to millions of views in a matter of days. Jill Louise Busby wasn’t expecting her video to go viral, but once it did she began to notice a “parallel between her performance of ‘diversity’ in the white corporate world and her performance of ‘wokeness’ for her followers.”
She quickly realized that both personas were scripted. And so she had to write about it.
Unfollow Me is a memoir-in-essays about each script and how her “micro-fame” began to infiltrate on real spaces and how that felt in her real life. It is “sharply personal” and critiques not only white fragility but her own perception of it. Busby will explain more on an upcoming episode of The Root Presents: It’s Lit! podcast, so tune in to understand why this writer’s brilliance went viral.
September 7, 2021, Bloomsbury Publishing
We Are Not Broken – George M. Johnson (Memoir/Young Adult)
George M. Johnson and their cousins Garrett, Rall and Rasul were raised by Nanny, their “fiercely devoted grandmother.” The children both hold each other together and hold space for each other’s emotions, finding “Black Boy Joy” even through tortuous events of racism, “and with Nanny at their center, they are never broken.”
George M. Johnson captures their unique experience of growing up as a Black boy in America internally struggling with their non-binary identity. We Are Not Broken explores themes such as vulnerability, sacrifice and culture and brings in a personal account that is “destined to become a modern classic of emerging adulthood.”
September 7, 2021, Little Brown Books for Young Readers
Zero O’Clock – Christopher John Farley (Young Adult)
At one point in 2020, COVID wasn’t something people were too worried about. But when New Rochelle got hit with some of the first cases, people started to take it more seriously. Geth Montego is not only dealing with regular high school problems—her best friend acting distant with college on the horizon, a boy she wants to ask to prom and BTS who are the only people who are ever there for her. In February, Geth’s small town becomes a hotspot for a rapidly spreading sickness and as things progress, she’s thrown into the center of Black Lives Matter protests where she’s forced to confront her beliefs but has to ask herself what she truly believes in.
September 7, 2021, Black Sheep
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