How We Fight for Our Lives: A Memoir

From award-winning poet Saeed Jones, How We Fight for Our Liveswinner of the Kirkus Prize and the Stonewall Book Awardis a moving, bracingly honest memoir (The New York Times Book Review) written at the crossroads of sex, race, and power. One of the best books of the year as selected by The New York Times; The Washington Post; NPR; Time; The New Yorker; O, The Oprah Magazine; Harpers Bazaar; Elle; BuzzFeed; Goodreads; and many more. People dont just happen, writes Saeed Jones. We sacrifice former versions of ourselves. We sacrifice the people who dared to raise us. The I it seems doesnt exist until we are able to say, I am no longer yours. Haunted and haunting, How We Fight for Our Lives is a stunning coming-of-age memoir about a young, black, gay man from the South as he fights to carve out a place for himself, within his family, within his country, within his own hopes, desires, and fears. Through a series of vignettes that chart a course across the American landscape, Jones draws readers into his boyhood and adolescenceinto tumultuous relationships with his family, into passing flings with lovers, friends, and strangers. Each piece builds into a larger examination of race and queerness, power and vulnerability, love and grief: a portrait of what we all do for one anotherand to one anotheras we fight to become ourselves. An award-winning poet, Jones has developed a style thats as beautiful as it is powerfula voice thats by turns a river, a blues, and a nightscape set ablaze. How We Fight for Our Lives is a one-of-a-kind memoir and a book that cements Saeed Jones as an essential writer for our time.