#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST Hailed by Toni Morrison as “required reading,” a bold and personal literary exploration of America’s racial history by “the most important essayist in a generation and a writer who changed the national … and a writer who changed the national political conversation about race” (Rolling Stone)
NAMED ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL BOOKS OF THE DECADE BY CNN • NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST MEMOIRS OF THE DECADE • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • O: The Oprah Magazine • The Washington Post • People • Entertainment Weekly • Vogue • Los Angeles Times • San Francisco Chronicle • Chicago Tribune • New York • Newsday • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly
In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation’s history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race,” a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men—bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden?
Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son. Coates shares with his son—and readers—the story of his awakening to the truth about his place in the world through a series of revelatory experiences, from Howard University to Civil War battlefields, from the South Side of Chicago to Paris, from his childhood home to the living rooms of mothers whose children’s lives were taken as American plunder. Beautifully woven from personal narrative, reimagined history, and fresh, emotionally charged reportage, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward.
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Not that interesting – synopsis was more interesting.
Awe-inspiring and provides outlooks I was not aware of before.
One of the most beautifully written books on a subject of which most people would rather not be reminded. This eye opening narrative will serve to wake people up to the millions and millions of slights and insults the adversary African American experiences. The injustices dealt by the legal system, corporate system and government will open your eyes.
Get another viewpoint about the reasons why racism is sp entrenched in America.
Thought-provoking
Everyone should read this book!
The message of this book is important and not in question, but the writing style, for me, was off-putting.
Fascinating insight into the life of a black parent
Profoundly moving
I bought this book (paid full price) for my daughter after hearing the author being interviewed on NPR. It is a topic I feel all should know about. I found it hard to read and my daughter never read it. She said she tried, but couldn’t get into it. It is going to the library fundraising sale.
Required and essential
A poetic and painful polemic on the legacy of race in America written as a letter by one “black” man to his son.
I could not relate to this book.
It will make you think in all of the best ways. Everyone should read.
We all need to read this book. I feel like I have had blinders on.
One of the best books I’ve ever read — and gifted!
I would give it 3 and 1/2 stars. It was an interesting take on racial relations.
Riveting
Great insight for white people.
I don’t get the point of this 155 page rant in the form of a letter. Coates is a far better author than this.