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A review by ralovesbooks
They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Hanif Abdurraqib
5.0
“The truth is, if we don’t write our own stories, there is someone else waiting to do it for us.”
WOW, this essay collection is one of the best books I’ve ever read. It blew my mind – the precision of the sentences to get to the heart of the matter and a rhythmic velocity of the language that kept me leaning forward. I read a bunch of it while I was at Longwood Gardens, which felt like an incongruous place to read about things like rap music, violence against Black people, and church shootings, but for whatever reason, it helped me concentrate. I sat there, pretzel-style, on a bench with the sound of fountains in the background, while the author dropped sharp observations and deep emotion. Amid the tough content, the descriptions of joy and grief stood out to me. He writes, “Joy alone will not grant anyone safety. It can, however, act as a small bit of fuel when the work of resistance becomes too much.” And, “The real grief is silence in a place where there was once noise.”
You’ve got to be kidding me, right? This book does not kid.
I don’t really know any of the music that’s discussed in this book, and I probably would have gotten more out of it if I did, but the writing is so good that it didn’t matter, because he’s talking about things we have all felt in words that exude joy, name grief, conjure a sense of home, point out injustice, or shine a spotlight on musical brilliance. It reminded me of other books that knocked me out with their force: Men We Reap by Jesmyn Ward, Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Fifth Season by NK Jemisin, and Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde.
It took me 5 years to read this book, but better late than never. I started shouting after the third essay, and I won’t shut up any time soon. READ IT! I already have Hanif’s newest release because it’s the Year of Essays, can’t stop, won’t stop.
WOW, this essay collection is one of the best books I’ve ever read. It blew my mind – the precision of the sentences to get to the heart of the matter and a rhythmic velocity of the language that kept me leaning forward. I read a bunch of it while I was at Longwood Gardens, which felt like an incongruous place to read about things like rap music, violence against Black people, and church shootings, but for whatever reason, it helped me concentrate. I sat there, pretzel-style, on a bench with the sound of fountains in the background, while the author dropped sharp observations and deep emotion. Amid the tough content, the descriptions of joy and grief stood out to me. He writes, “Joy alone will not grant anyone safety. It can, however, act as a small bit of fuel when the work of resistance becomes too much.” And, “The real grief is silence in a place where there was once noise.”
You’ve got to be kidding me, right? This book does not kid.
I don’t really know any of the music that’s discussed in this book, and I probably would have gotten more out of it if I did, but the writing is so good that it didn’t matter, because he’s talking about things we have all felt in words that exude joy, name grief, conjure a sense of home, point out injustice, or shine a spotlight on musical brilliance. It reminded me of other books that knocked me out with their force: Men We Reap by Jesmyn Ward, Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Fifth Season by NK Jemisin, and Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde.
It took me 5 years to read this book, but better late than never. I started shouting after the third essay, and I won’t shut up any time soon. READ IT! I already have Hanif’s newest release because it’s the Year of Essays, can’t stop, won’t stop.