what doesn’t kill you makes you blacker
-
10 Awkward AF Things That Soliciting Blurbs for Your Book Also Feels Like
The writing of blurbs—the succinct quotes of praise from an author’s peers that exist on a book’s front and back covers—has become a “nuclear arms race” that can drain blurb writers of their most valuable asset (time), writes Marie Myung-Ok Lee yesterday in an extensive feature on this quirk of the publishing industry. (A piece…
-
Galleys, Explained
What happened? Is what what you think you’re seeing? No, it’s not. Not yet at least. (Also, chill with the nigga chants. We don’t know each other like that. I don’t even know if you’re black.) Yes and no. Just “now?” I have time. What you’re looking at are called galleys. A galley is a…
-
On Reading Kiese Laymon’s Singular and Indestructible Heavy on the 5th Anniversary of My Mom’s Death
With his devastating and resplendent and transcendent Heavy, Kiese Laymon conjured, created and gave us a thing that each person who conjures, creates and gives things aspires to do, and that’s to create a thing that only he could have created. Of course, for the people who conjure, create and give things for a living,…
-
Nothing Reminds You That You're Black in White America Like Trying to Buy a House
Five weeks ago, moments after landing back in Pittsburgh after a two-day long trip to Chicago, I switched off airplane mode, checked my phone, and saw a transcribed voicemail from my mortgage consultant, asking me to call him back. We were 11 days away from closing. The loan and the interest rate had already been…
-
What It Looks Like When the Whole Team's Winning
A few years back, one of my best friends had the opportunity to go back to his home church in D.C. and give a speech during a service. As a son of the church, he was speaking on his journey from his beginnings in southeast Washington, D.C., to, at that point in time, receiving his…
-
10 Quick Things About What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Blacker, an Upcoming Memoir in Essays From Damon Young
Yes, I did. It’s right there in my bio, man. But just in case you didn’t read—and you very obviously didn’t—in the fall of 2016, I signed a two-book deal with Ecco Books, an imprint of HarperCollins. This is the first book. It’s a look at some of the absurdities, angsts and anxieties of existing…