The Fire Next Time - James Baldwin

I read this in two days. Why? Because James Baldwin is so compelling. Because he has such a wonderful eye for nuance. Baldwin and I have had wildly different life experiences. He grew up in Harlem and was there during the Harlem Riot of 1943 on his 19th birthday. But his words really spoke to me, plainly and beautifully about his experience and his hopes. 

The Fire Next Time is a collection of two essays originally published in The New Yorker. The first is a letter written to Baldwin's nephew that explores race in America and how his nephew might experience it. He cautions his nephew away from anger and into a love of self and blackness. An embrace of the Black is Beautiful aspect. 

The second essay digs into Baldwin's experience of Christianity and the racist misuse of the gospel. Baldwin spent time as a teenage preacher and the experience led him to turn away from religion altogether. Having seen the inside of the pulpit, he likened it to seeing behind the curtain of a theater and thus being disenchanted with the entire show. One cannot ignore the intersection of race and sexuality and its effect on Baldwin's experience. 

The Fire Next Time later became an influence for Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me and having now read both, I can see the influence there. While it is a snapshot in time of Baldwin's experience, The Fire Next Time is also timeless in its themes. 

4/5 Stars. 

The South Side: A Portrait of Chicago and American Segregation - Natalie Y. Moore

For eight years we lived in Chicago, I was an avid WBEZ listener. I am well acquainted with Natalie Moore's reporting. I appreciate that she unapologetically covered issues important to Chicago's South Side during her time as a reporter there.

I have to admit, at the time, I sometimes wondered why she so fervently spent time covering the South Side. Living on the North Side as we did for eight years, you can lose track of the vastness that is Chicago. The vibrancy of the neighborhoods. It really is a City of neighborhoods where each enclave exists unto itself. So places that have problems, like portions of the South and West sides, get ignored or put to the side. You can focus on Chicago as a whole and claim that its problems are confined to a few neighborhoods and leave it at that. I've done that.

What this book, The Southside, does, brilliantly, is tie all those things together. It talks about the genesis of the South Side, its decline, and the reasons for that. It also details the efforts of community organizers and citizens who rather than leave their troubled neighborhoods, commit to making it better. For everyone. No one is going in to save the South Side. Should it get more help and resources? Absolutely. Will it? History says no. So the people have determined they must work for themselves.

Moore discusses health, housing, violence, and education issues all affecting the South Side. It really was an illuminating look at something I hadn't devoted enough time to as a citizen of the city (full disclosure - we lived in Evanston, just over the city line, but I worked and went to school in the city). This is a great read for anyone who wants to learn more about what really goes on in Chicago. It challenges a lot of assumptions and laziness on the part of pundits who like to say things about Chicago without any context from the people living and working in the City. 

4/5 Stars. 

The Vanishing Half - Brit Bennett

Stella and Desiree are twins who grow up in Mallard, Louisiana where the lightness of your skin is prized above all else. When the girls leave as teens, they shock the town who see nothing wrong with the place they live.

The book begins with Desiree returning to town with her dark child in tow. What has become of Stella we don't know but it is eventually teased out over the course of the book. Desiree rebelled against Mallard by going to DC eventually and working for the FBI as a fingerprint examiner. She married a dark man and had a dark child. But when the man ended up being violent and abusive she went back to Mallard. Preferring to live a smaller life of safety even if it meant returning to Mallard. Desiree puts no value on the lightness of her skin. And she guides her daughter through the difficulty of living in that environment.

We then find out that Stella left New Orleans without telling her sister. Passing as white and living under a cloud of shame. She can never fully relax, can never be herself truly as she knows the cost to her life if anyone were to find out her secret. She makes a life for herself and then eventually, through her daughter, finds some way to pursue the studies and qualities of herself that she has suppressed for so long. There is so much narrative tension created through all the Stella chapters. Brit Bennett does a remarkable job stretching that out for the reader.

The book then moves on to Stella and Desiree's daughters. The two could not be more different but as they learn about each other it makes them explore the ways they are similar and what their lives have meant. This book is beautifully written. Even the minor male characters are so well drawn by the pages I can see them in my mind.

The Vanishing Half is a joy to read, even as it tackles some very deep family rifts and personal traumas.

5/5 Stars. 

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness - Michelle Alexander

I knew when I was on my third hour of the introduction that Michelle Alexander was not messing around in The New Jim Crow. Exhaustively researched, this book drops like a megaton bomb into the quiet assumptions we make about ourselves and our "so-called" criminal justice system.

And the shocking thing for me at least, is that I already knew a lot of the pieces presented here. I went to law school. I clerked for two years for the Cook County States Attorney's office and I saw plea after plea go down in the felony trial division. But seeing all the pieces I had seen and experienced put together like this, it was like I had been seeing pieces of a puzzle for over a decade and now finally saw the picture that the pieces made.

And it's not pretty. The puzzle is a horribly crippling and unjust system that perpetuates poverty and violence in communities of color. It's a system that tags people with the word "felon" and then never lets them go. It is a lifelong stigma and legal leash on people who are arrested and convicted many times for doing the same thing other people are doing in the less-policed suburbs of America, or the dorm rooms of our higher learning institutions.

How do we move on from here? How do we dismantle the War on Drugs when so many private interests are now invested in its perpetuation? Because that is the next step. It has to be. Lives have been destroyed. Communities have been destroyed. And for what? So the haves can keep having and the have-nots can foot the bill. Because in the communities of the affluent, these will continue to be "mistakes" and in poor communities, they are crimes.

4/5 Stars. 

Little Fires Everywhere - Celeste Ng

Who doesn't love to hate on a character now and then. In Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng gives us a whole family of characters to hate on. 

When Mia and Pearl move to Shaker Heights, Ohio, Mia promises her 15 year old daughter that for once, they will stay put. Mia, who is an artist constantly moving where her inspiration takes her, knows this kind of stability will be a gift to her daughter, who has attended more alma maters than is probably advised.

Mia rents an upstairs unit from the Richardson family - a perfectly situated family of four children (two boys and two girls) with a lawyer father and journalist mother. Elena may have at one time aspired to more than a local beat at a tier three paper, but she never went for it. Now she's content to believe her opinions and her beliefs are the best. She's managed to raise three exceptionally selfish children, and treats the youngest pretty horribly. Now I'm not saying I don't have my moments when we're late leaving the house and my child is crying about how her/his seat belt won't buckle and somehow it's my fault and they hate me, that I don't react in a way that is less than motherly, but c'mon Elena Richardson, your daughter is still a CHILD. Phew. 

So anyway, Mia is a pretty level headed person although she's got some secrets, but she genuinely feels for people. And Pearl starts to hang out more with the Richardsons, finding a kindred spirit in the younger boy, Moody, and finding a smoking hot smoldering spirit for the older brother, Tripp, who, let's face it, has had too much of his life be easy to be anything other than slightly less than an asshole. The older daughter, Lexie, is also incredibly selfish although there is a hint of that starting to change. And Moody, who we may have some sympathy for, ends up being kind of an asshole too. Which leaves the youngest daughter, Izzie, who, constantly berated and unloved by her own mother, has a bunch of issues and is seriously just looking for someone (Mia) to love her. Sad.

And all that would be fine if Elena Richardson didn't have a friend so focused on having a baby that she would railroad the child's biological mother in her quest for custody. Because she does, and that brings out everyone's thoughts and feelings on the subject. When it turns out Mia doesn't agree with Elena, Elena goes through some pretty sneaky and unethical shit to get dirt on Mia. 

I wasn't a huge fan of the ending only because I wanted Elena Richardson to really get hers but alas, this book is probably more like real life where Karma is a bitch, but not always egalitarian. Celeste does some really great work with white privilege, white saviorism, and class distinctions that work really well in the book. I enjoyed it and her writing.

4/5 Stars

The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison

As I sat here, thinking about how to convey my feelings and heartbreak over reading The Bluest Eye, my phone notification tells me that Toni Morrison, Novel Laureate and Pulitizer Prize winner has died at age 88. Her long life was a gift to literature and to arts. That her death comes after two days of media coverage surrounding back to back mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton makes a kind of literary sense in that Toni Morrison was ever a critic of our culture and the often banal cruelty inflicted on minorities, women, and children. 

In The Bluest Eye, Morrison set out to detail and chronicle the destruction of innocence in the literal break down of Pecola, a twelve year old girl who, by the end of the novel, has suffered cruelties minor and grievous resulting in her complete psychotic break. And the language Morrison uses to describe this degradation, its smooth flow and lyrical beauty can make you forget that you are reading something abjectly terrible. And it is, abjectly terrible, and difficult to read, and yet, Morrison pulls no punches. She wants you to be aware of the ways in which humans are capable of destroying other humans. 

“Along with the idea of romantic love, she was introduced to another--physical beauty. Probably the most destructive ideas in the history of human thought. Both originated in envy, thrived in insecurity, and ended in disillusion.” 
― Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

When you pick up a Toni Morrison novel you better be ready for your heart to break in ways you didn't know existed. That the Bluest Eye was the first such novel in a series of ever sharpening craft, that she was actually disappointed in later years at her inability to create a more seamless piece of art, is a testament to the growth and skill she acquired as she toiled at this work. 

And Morrison was ever sure of herself and the place in the literary universe where her novels lived. I once saw a interview an Australian morning show did with her where the journalist asked Toni if she would ever consider writing books about white characters. Toni looked this woman dead in the eye for an uncomfortable amount of silence for TV purposes and asked if the journalist had any idea how racist such a question was? 

That such a voice has left the literary world is no question a loss, but we can be grateful for the body of work she leaves behind.

4/5 Stars.

Black Klansman: Race, Hate, and the Undercover Investigations of a Lifetime - Ron Stallworth

I'm definitely a "read the book before seeing the movie kind of person" especially when a movie is about real life events because I know Hollywood has a tendency to make things very "Hollywood". So I was very excited to see this book was available from my library.

Quick and to the point, Black Klansman tells the story of Ron Stallworth's undercover infiltration into the KKK in Colorado Springs in 1979. As a black man, this was an extraordinary feat, and the way he was able to quickly gain the trust of not only the local chapter but also David Duke himself is amusing and a testament to Ron's quick thinking and long range vision for where he wanted to take the investigation. 

Told by Stallworth himself, Black Klansman gives the details of Stallworth's involvement and the intricate politics walked in the police department in order to make this investigation a go. The reader gets to laugh along with Stallworth as the unwitting klan members enthusiastically support his taking over the local chapter and their sincere affirmations that they would absolutely know if they were talking to a black person on the phone (they clearly did not). 

I'm excited to see the movie now. Spike Lee is a master story teller, and while Ron lived the story of a lifetime, his livelihood doesn't rely on his story-craft.  It would all be a good laugh at these silly dum-dums if they weren't so ignorant but also evil. I had no idea that Colorado had such a racist history but there's likely politicians with klan connections in every state in the union when we look closely enough. 

In the face of such ignorant hate, Black Klansman is a good reminder that it's not enough to just not be racist. We need to be anti-racist.

3.5/5 Stars. 

Queenie - Candice Carty-Williams

You have to admit this amazing cover art catches your eye and makes you wonder what might be inside. And the inside is just as beautiful. Queenie Jenkins is on the cusp of something good. She has a steady boyfriend, Tom, who has suggested marriage, and she's landed a job at a magazine. So what if Tom's family is racist and he doesn't seem to care. So what if the job is managing listings and not writing about issues that really matter to Queenie. She's ALMOST there.

And then. She isn't. Tom wants a break. A clean break. And this begins a spiral for Queenie who must confront some of the things that have made her adult life difficult. Painful, heartbreaking episodes from her childhood are hinted, and then drawn out fully as we grieve and learn with Queenie.

At times completely hilarious and then equally heartbreaking, this book really does do it all. Queenie's friends are dismayed and helpless to halt her downward spiral and I felt these same feelings along with them. I felt like Queenie's friend. I was rooting for her. I wanted her to figure out these things she was doing to herself and allowing to happen to herself. The book brings up uncomfortable questions of self acceptance and worth and race. And it does it all in the most excellent writing. 

I was so thrilled to find this book in my mail box courtesy of Scout Press Books. I can't wait to share this book with everyone.

5/5 Stars. 

Becoming - Michelle Obama

"... sameness breeds more sameness, until you make a thoughtful effort to counteract it."

What can I possibly say about Michelle Obama that hasn't been said before? Becoming is the telling of her story - well known to those who care to know it. She grew up on the lower end of middle class on Chicago's south side, in a neighborhood on a downward slide amid white flight to the suburbs. She was supported by two loving parents who pushed hard for her education and was accepted at the Whitney Young Magnet School in downtown Chicago. From there she went to Princeton, a school at which high school counselor had told her she did not belong. Then she continued on to Harvard Law School, accepted off the wait list. From there she was hired as an associate at Sidley Austin, a large law firm in Chicago and where she met summer associate, Barack Obama, serving as his advisor at the firm. 

Michelle grew tired of the law firm grind, wanting to do more with her life. She left there for a job at the City, working with Valerie Jarrett. Then on to a non-profit creating mentoring programs for young underprivileged people - connecting young people with promise, but not opportunity - with non-profits in need of talent and tenacity. By the time her husband was a United States Senator, Michelle was working as an executive at the University of Chicago Medical Center. Her mission? Helping the Medical Center and University make an impact in the south side neighborhood where it provided little opportunity and no tax base for the surrounding citizens. 

I'm aware of the things that are said about Michelle. That she only cares about money. If that was the case she could have stayed as a high-powered Sidley attorney making a hefty mid-six figure summary. That she hates America. Which in itself is a ridiculous thing to throw at someone, but in any case, would a person who hates this country give so much back to it? Focus signature programs and dedicate her professional life prior to becoming a public figure to bettering America's most needy communities? 

This well-educated, eloquent, smart, funny, deep, and thoughtful human being made her signature policy in the White House a focus on the growing childhood obesity epidemic and ways to combat that through exercise and nutrition. That's right. She asked parents, schools, restaurants, manufacturers, and corporations to make better decisions for children's health.

And people hate her for it.

I don't know how she could have put up with it. I don't know why anyone would want to. But she did. And she opened the White House up to vast numbers of "regular" Americans. She visited wounded service members at Walter Reed Medical Center. She gave commencement speeches at universities and high schools who could hardly believe their fortune in snagging such a high profile speaker. 

She cared about all Americans. Black Americans. Brown Americans. Poor Americans. Veterans. Groups that are marginalized and overlooked. She noted where our country, through policy, negligence, malice, or ignorance, failed these groups.

And people hate her for it. 

So yeah, I know she doesn't need my defense. Because Michelle is doing just fine on her own. But sometimes I look at the headlines and the vitriol spewed in the comments section of social media (I know, I know, I need to not read them) and I think about whether I am doing enough to reflect the country as I think it is or could be. And in that I feel a real kinship with Michelle Obama and the causes she's committed her life to and the way she's chosen to live her life. 

The question is: “Do we settle for the world as it is, or do we work for the world as it should be?”

5/5 Stars. 

Sing, Unburied, Sing - Jesmyn Ward

There's a definite flow to the language of this book that takes a minute to get into, but once you get used to it, the prose of Sing, Unburied, Sing is really beautiful. And the story, oh God, the story. 

SUS is told from three perspectives: first, JoJo, a 13 year old boy who is trying to learn how to be a man from his grandfather, Pop. But JoJo faces challenges in the form of his barely engaged mother and his incarcerated father. This beautiful boy saves his whole heart for his three year old sister, Kayla. Oh, and his grandmother is dying from stomach cancer. Oh and his uncle, Given, was shot and killed by some racist Good Ole Boy because he shot a deer with an arrow better than this POS used a shotgun. 

So JoJo and Kayla are dragged by their mother to pick up their father from jail. On their way upstate, they are taken to a meth kitchen and a meth dealer's house, the entire time JoJo having to steal food for him and Kayla, otherwise their mother, Leonie would completely forget. And once they pick up their father, Michael, better decisions are still not made. 

The story of this family would have been enough on it's own, but Ward attempts to go deeper and further by involving ghosts in this story. Leonie is haunted both literally and figuratively by her dead brother, Given. JoJo meets a ghost in the form of a former prison inmate who was contemporaries with his grandfather. The boy was 13 when he was incarcerated with much older men. 

But in Mississippi a 13-year-old black boy is seen as an adult, as a threat. And this comes down on JoJo just as hard as it did on the ghost, Richie. And there's no resolution to this issue because this is America. But the journey of the story is well written while heartbreaking for all the failings of the parents and the despair of the grandparents.

4/5 Stars.