What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man’s Blues

In this thoughtful memoir, Thompson (Love for Sale and Other Essays), a professor at New York University and Sarah Lawrence College, considers his life in a racially and culturally divided America. He recalls his Christian childhood in a nurturing 1970s Washington, D.C., community—one that was imperfect but was committed to treating others with openness and respect. Throughout life, he turned to such authors as James Baldwin, Stanley Crouch, and especially Albert Murray, whose work emphasized “the integral place of blacks in America, a legacy of grit, resourcefulness, accomplishment, and improvisation... and jazz.” Once in college, he “felt like the only black person I knew who was not reluctant... to be in the predominantly white settings.” He married the blond daughter of a Manhattan book editor, fathered biracial children, and encountered racism (he admits, however, to being “luckier than many black people”). Throughout, he opines on President Trump’s inept leadership (the election was “an unqualified disaster”) and the loyalty of Trump’s supporters (a retiree he interviewed called Trump “a man who had the backbone to stand up for what he thought, and would say so”). Ever the optimist, the author concludes: “Just remember they’re not all the same, just like we’re not all the same.” In prose that is subtle and graceful, Thompson’s narrative casts a refreshing light on race in America. (Nov.)