"Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self" by Danielle Evans
"Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self" by Danielle Evans
I was originally interested in this book just for the title. (Which turns out to be a line from a poem by Donna Kate Rushin.)
It's a collection of short stories featuring African-American and mixed-race characters. The stories deal with issues of race and class, and with relationships of all sorts (romantic, friendship, family) through the lives of a variety of fully realized characters. Sometimes it's hard to get a "feel" for what a person is like in a shorter format but not in these stories. I also liked that they dealt with the reality of life, and the fact that not everything ends happily... and not everything ends when you want it to, either.
Also I felt the stories were consistently good, with none that I felt brought the collection down. I highly recommend this book.
I was originally interested in this book just for the title. (Which turns out to be a line from a poem by Donna Kate Rushin.)
It's a collection of short stories featuring African-American and mixed-race characters. The stories deal with issues of race and class, and with relationships of all sorts (romantic, friendship, family) through the lives of a variety of fully realized characters. Sometimes it's hard to get a "feel" for what a person is like in a shorter format but not in these stories. I also liked that they dealt with the reality of life, and the fact that not everything ends happily... and not everything ends when you want it to, either.
Also I felt the stories were consistently good, with none that I felt brought the collection down. I highly recommend this book.