How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America

(Hardback)

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'I was stunned into stillness' Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist Ive had guns pulled on me by four people under Central Mississippi skies once by a white undercover cop, once by a young brother trying to rob me for the left-overs of a weak work-study check, once by my mother and twice by myself. Not sure how or if Ive helped many folks say yes to life, but Ive definitely aided in a few folks dying slowly in America, all without the aid of a gun Kiese Laymon grew up in Jackson, Mississippi. That was where he started to write and where he began to seek to create an honest account of living in the US, a country striving to declare itself multi-cultural, post-racial and mostly innocent. This is that account. Drawing on his own personal experiences, these essays are Laymons attempt to deal with many issues occupying America today, from race, identity and writing to music, celebrity and violence. Through letters between his own disparate family members, pleas to performers whose voices will never be heard again, recollections of his own failure to become a world-famous emcee, analysis of the growing culture of fear in the media and detailed accounts of his clashes with an education system that has both advanced and failed the generation he grew up in, Laymon gets closer not only to the truth behind himself, but to the promises behind the promised land. Searing and passionate, this timely collection of essays introduces a vibrant new voice in US literature and offers a unique insight into the forces that are tearing America apart today.

Reviews

Endlessly intriguing Laymon approached How to Slowly Kill as an album, with each essay a different track. The book contains odes to black American heroes, dirges and ballads to family members past and present, and the occasional skit. At its core beats the rat-a-tat-tat that knocks at the core of modern America: the shameful, insidious racism endured by the hyphenated African-American population * Independent *
A blistering new voice, fearless, funny and uncompromising, these vivid personal accounts illuminate the dynamics of a black America grappling with a complex legacy. Achingly relevant * Irenosen Okojie *
He is intimately attuned to the confusion of young black Americans who live under the shadow of a history that they only gropingly understand and must try to fill in for themselves * Wall Street Journal *
Kiese Laymon's powerful writing on race in America hit me square in the stomach. He perfectly illustrates a space between imprisonment and freedom, the state of being out, but not quite free * Reni Eddo Lodge *
Examining issues of race, family and what is tearing America apart * Irish Times, Books to Watch Out For in 2016 *
Laymons voice is unique * Chicago Book Review *
A brilliant young writer * William Henry Lewis, author of I Got Somebody in Staunton *
The racial/ethical awareness is as complex as Coetzees, and Laymon is just as good a writer * Tim Strode, author of Ethics of Exile *
Master wordsmith Laymon shook minds with his brutally introspective personal essay * Ebony *

Author Bio

Kiese Laymon was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. He earned an MFA from Indiana University and is currently an Associate Professor of English at Vassar College. He has written essays and stories for numerous publications. Laymon was selected a member of the Root 100 in 2013 and 2014, and is the recipient of the 2015-2016 Grisham Writer in Residence Fellowship at the University of Mississippi. He is also the author of a novel, Long Division, which won the Saroyan International Prize for Writing. @KieseLaymon / kieselaymon.com