An arresting account of Black ambition and endurance from an important new voice in narrative nonfiction.
A unique synthesis of memoir and a history of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.
Tulsa native Young, a FOX Sports analyst, offers an ambitious, forceful continuance of his debut memoir, Let It Bang, focused on his development as a consciously Black writer while dogged by the massacre’s uneasy centennial. The author opens with the horrific flashpoint, in which an ambiguous encounter between a Black boy and a White girl spiraled into an attempted lynching followed by the coordinated destruction of the Greenwood district, the so-called Black Wall Street, by the National Guard and White citizens. Decades of denial suggested premeditation motivated by envy over the accomplishments of the Greenwood community. “White folks decided they’d had enough of the luminous district many saw as a leprosy,” writes Young, “and they aimed to kill it.” In addition to recounting the history, Young interweaves a jaundiced, potent examination of his own upbringing. He rebelled gradually against his conservative churchgoing parents as he endured a casually menacing racism that reflected the legacy of the massacre. Yet while enduring poverty, depression, and a failed marriage in his 20s, he found improbable salvation in Oklahoma’s athletic tradition, breaking through as a sportswriter and radio personality. In the final chapters, Young highlights his emotional disbelief over the tone-deaf centennial celebration. “No one outside of this place much cares what happens to it,” he writes, “only what had once happened to it when white Tulsans murdered Black Tulsans.” The author also reflects thoughtfully on thorny subtopics ranging from interracial relationships to Donald Trump’s grotesque return to the rally stage, in Tulsa, at the height of the pandemic. The swerve toward the personal is occasionally jarring, but the author’s prose is consistently acute and his societal analysis, astute. “To be a Black American,” he writes, “is to want some of what white folks have and to hate yourself for wanting it all at once.”
An arresting account of Black ambition and endurance from an important new voice in narrative nonfiction.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-64009-502-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Counterpoint
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
An important dialogue at a fraught time, emphasizing mutual candor, curiosity, and respect.
Two bestselling authors engage in an enlightening back-and-forth about Jewishness and antisemitism.
Acho, author of Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man, and Tishby, author of Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth, discuss many of the searing issues for Jews today, delving into whether Jewishness is a religion, culture, ethnicity, or community—or all of the above. As Tishby points out, unlike in Christianity, one can be comfortably atheist and still be considered a Jew. She defines Judaism as a “big tent” religion with four main elements: religion, peoplehood, nationhood, and the idea of tikkun olam (“repairing the world through our actions”). She addresses candidly the hurtful stereotypes about Jews (that they are rich and powerful) that Acho grew up with in Dallas and how Jews internalize these antisemitic judgments. Moreover, Tishby notes, “it is literally impossible to be Jewish and not have any connection with Israel, and I’m not talking about borders or a dot on the map. Judaism…is an indigenous religion.” Acho wonders if one can legitimately criticize “Jewish people and their ideologies” without being antisemitic, and Tishby offers ways to check whether one’s criticism of Jews or Zionism is antisemitic or factually straightforward. The authors also touch on the deteriorating relationship between Black and Jewish Americans, despite their historically close alliance during the civil rights era. “As long as Jewish people get to benefit from appearing white while Black people have to suffer for being Black, there will always be resentment,” notes Acho. “Because the same thing that grants you all access—your skin color—is what grants us pain and punishment in perpetuity.” Finally, the authors underscore the importance of being mutual allies, and they conclude with helpful indexes on vernacular terms and customs.
An important dialogue at a fraught time, emphasizing mutual candor, curiosity, and respect.Pub Date: April 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781668057858
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Simon Element
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change.
Artist and activist Vaid-Menon demonstrates how the normativity of the gender binary represses creativity and inflicts physical and emotional violence.
The author, whose parents emigrated from India, writes about how enforcement of the gender binary begins before birth and affects people in all stages of life, with people of color being especially vulnerable due to Western conceptions of gender as binary. Gender assignments create a narrative for how a person should behave, what they are allowed to like or wear, and how they express themself. Punishment of nonconformity leads to an inseparable link between gender and shame. Vaid-Menon challenges familiar arguments against gender nonconformity, breaking them down into four categories—dismissal, inconvenience, biology, and the slippery slope (fear of the consequences of acceptance). Headers in bold font create an accessible navigation experience from one analysis to the next. The prose maintains a conversational tone that feels as intimate and vulnerable as talking with a best friend. At the same time, the author's turns of phrase in moments of deep insight ring with precision and poetry. In one reflection, they write, “the most lethal part of the human body is not the fist; it is the eye. What people see and how people see it has everything to do with power.” While this short essay speaks honestly of pain and injustice, it concludes with encouragement and an invitation into a future that celebrates transformation.
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change. (writing prompt) (Nonfiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09465-5
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
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