How We Fight for Our Lives by Saeed Jones

Before Saeed Jones authored a memoir, he was a poet. That lyricism lives and breathes in passages like this one: . "A joke I used to repeat in those days was: Why be happy when you can be interesting? I knew how to be interesting. There was power in being a spectacle, even a miserable spectacle. The punch and the line. Interesting: sentences like serrated blades, laughter like machine-gun rounds, a drink in one hand, a borrowed cigarette in the other. If you could draw enough glances, any room could orbit around you." . I read a lot of memoirs, but few expose their authors so completely as How We Fight For Our Lives. Heavy by Kiese Laymon comes to mind (but make sure to take a breath between them). I was alternately awed, horrified, and uncomfortable as I listened to Jones unfurl his life like a map - growing up as a gay Black man in the Southern US - his story impossibly, painfully vulnerable and his experience so completely different from my own. I know many people are looking to read and spotlight Black voices and LGBTQ+ books this month (and every month), and How We Fight For Our Lives is an excellent choice. I highly recommend the audiobook, which is narrated by the author (and is just 6 hours)! . TW: homophobia, racism, graphic sexual content, sexual assault, death of a parent via Instagram https://instagr.am/p/CBAyVnvg9W2/