Wednesday, August 9, 2017

Review: Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body

Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxane Gay
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

So raw and vulnerable to read, let alone to think about what it took to write this memoir. Hit close to home in a lot of ways, which is true for many readers, I think, judging by the ratings.

Damn, she's a great writer.

And here is what she writes about Charleston, Illinois, and Eastern Illinois University. From pages 294-295, "We were three hours from Chicago, so my blackness was less of a curiosity, more of a threat. And there were the black students on campus, the nerve of them, daring to pursue higher education. In the local newspaper, residents wrote angry letters about a new criminal element--the scourge of youthful black ambition, black joy. In my more generous moments, I tried to believe the locals were using anger to mask their fear of living in a dying town in a changing world."

I feel like I need to re-read that last sentence on a regular basis.

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