Sponsored by Henry Holt & Co.
Elizabeth is tired. Years after coming to New York to try to build a life, she has found herself with two kids, a husband, two jobs, a PhD―and now they’re filing for bankruptcy after struggling with debt. She tries to balance her dream and the impossibility of striving toward it while her work and home lives feel poised to fall apart. Grappling with motherhood, economic anxiety, and anger, Want is a fiercely personal novel that explores the subtle violences enacted on a certain type of woman when she dares to want things.
Welcome to Read This Book, a weekly newsletter where I recommend one book that I think you absolutely must read. The books will vary across genre and age category to include new releases, backlist titles, and classics. If you’re ready to explode your TBR, buckle up!
Hello, I am back in your inbox after a week off due to the Fourth of July weekend, and I am so excited about this week’s pick, which totally embodies summer shenanigans and fun–The Season of Styx Malone by Kekla Magoon.
Caleb and his brother Bobby Gene never go anywhere, which is why they have to make their own fun at home. After a misadventure involving trading their baby sister to a neighborhood boy who always wanted a sister in exchange for a bag of fireworks, the brothers meet an older boy named Styx Malone. Styx tells them about the Great Escalator Trade–trading up smaller things for something worth slightly more, until you can get something you really want. Before they know it, the boys have set their sights on a motorized scooter–but Caleb and Bobby Gene are breaking their parents’ rules to get the trades they need.
This middle grade adventure will definitely appeal to fans of Christopher Paul Curtis for its laugh out loud humor and hijinks, and careful examination of larger, more serious social issues. Readers will be all in from the beginning with Caleb’s earnest an humorous narration about wanting something more out of his life than just sticking around home–he doesn’t want to be ordinary. Styx seems like a ticket to adventure, to fun, and to making his mark, and the slow reveal that Styx might be in over his head is masterful, leading to some lies, betrayals, and big revelations about why Caleb and his family stick so close to home all the time–it has to do with his dad’s fear that Caleb and Bobby Gene might be seen as a threat anywhere outside their small town. Most kids might not make the clear connection between Caleb’s dad’s fear and the tremendous loss of Black life in America, but the subtlety is what’s so brilliant about this book.
This is a novel about three Black boys having adventures, scheming their next trade, and getting into a little bit of trouble, but it’s not a book about tragedy. The characters don’t exist in a vacuum; their story is about finding fun and joy, learning that each person has something extraordinary inside of them, and that sometimes adults let you down, but the good ones are just trying to keep you safe.
With so much attention being given to books about anti-racism, please remember to pick up books about Black joy, too! This is an excellent pick, plus the audiobook was so much fun!
Happy reading,
Tirzah
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