Like many books that I pick up, An American Marriage by Tayari Jones ended up on my to-read list after I heard a story on NPR. Interviewed by Karen Grigsby-Bates last February, Jones said she had done a lot of research on criminal justice and race to prepare to write a book but that nothing was clicking until she went home to visit her mom over the holidays and overheard a conversation in an Atlanta mall: JONES: The woman was beautifully dressed, and the young man, he […]
Another Book That Led Me to Crack Open My Wallet
Like many nonfiction books that I pick up, Becoming Ms. Burton, was featured on NPR’s Fresh Air earlier this summer. I had recently read Just Mercy and come off a spring semester of using “mass incarceration” as a model “wicked problem” that needed systems thinking to solve in my Composition 1 class. [Students then picked their own “problem” to investigate and understand better for their research project.] It was interesting then to hear Susan Burton’s story of how she hit rock bottom after the death […]
A Better Piper
I’m assuming everyone has watched the Netflix series by now. Because if you haven’t, then I don’t understand what you are doing with your life. Do you not like being happy? Do you not liking having nice things? The show and the book are very different. But, if you were shying away from picking up the book because Nexflix Piper is a tool, Book Piper is much, much better (as is Book Larry, not that that is much of a feat). But there’s also more of […]