The Stacks is thrilled to welcome Kiese Laymon to the show. If you’re a longtime fan of the podcast, you’ve heard Kiese mentioned countless times from authors and readers alike. Kiese is an author (Heavy, How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America), essayist, and professor at The University of Mississippi. Today we discuss living revision, writing sentences, crafting nonfiction and the depths of fiction. Then we get into Kiese’s favorite books, you’ll want to get your TBR ready!
The Stacks Book Club selection for July is Breathe by Imani Perry, we will discuss the book with Kiese Laymon on July 29th.
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Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.
Books
- Heavy by Kiese Laymon
- Long Division by Kiese Laymon
- How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America by Kiese Laymon
- Breathe by Imani Perry
- William Faulkner
- Jesmyn Ward
- James Baldwin
- How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
- White Fragility by Robin Diangelo
- White Negroes by Lauren Michele Jackson
- Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
- John Steinbeck
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Beloved by Toni Morrison
- Paradise Lost by John Milton
- The Sellout by Paul Beatty
- Heads of the Colored People by Nafissa Thompson-Spires
- Drinking Coffee Elsewhere by ZZ Packer
- Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self by Danielle Evans
- The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw
- Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
- Look Both Ways by Jason Reynolds
- Gorilla, My Love by Toni Cade Bambara
- Prophets of the Hood by Imani Perry
- The Red Badge of Courage and Four Stories by Stephen Crane
- The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr.
- A House is a Body by Shruti Swamy
- Directed by Desire by June Jordan
- Audre Lorde
- The Sixth Man by Andre Iguodala
- The Autobiography of Gucci Mane by Gucci Mane with Neil Martinez-Belkin
- The Mamba Mentality by Kobe Bryant
- Don’t Let the Lipstick Fool You by Lisa Leslie
- Memorial Drive by Natasha Trethewey
- The Yellow House by Sarah M. Broom
- The Street by Ann Petry
- The Room Where It Happened by John Bolton
- Unhinged by Omarosa Manigault Newman
- Othello by William Shakespeare
- Richard III by William Shakespeare
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare
- Pimp by Iceberg Slim
- Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
- 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup
Everything Else
- Millsaps College
- Jackson State University
- Oberlin College
- Indiana University
- Vassar College
- University of Mississippi
- “City Summer, Country Summer” (Kiese Laymon and Andre Wagner, The New York Times)
- Andre Wagner
- “Da Art of Storytellin’ (A Prequel)” (Kiese Laymon, Oxford American)
- Outkast
- Michael Jordan
- Lebron James
- Black Artists for Freedom
- Lisa Lucas
- National Book Foundation
- Charlene Carruthers
- Darnell Moore
- “Literary Quilt: A Covering for George Floyd” (The Crisis Magazine)
- “What’s Missing From ‘White Fragility'” (Lauren Michele Jackson, Slate)
- “The Short Stacks 22: Ibram X. Kendi//How to Be an Antiracist” (The Stacks)
- “Ep. 60 Beloved by Toni Morrison — The Stacks Book Club (DaMaris B. Hill)” (The Stacks)
- “Ep. 89 Staying True to Yourself with Jason Reynolds” (The Stacks)
- Jason Richardson
- Sullivan Jones
- Barack Obama’s 2019 Book List
- Gone with the Wind (Victor Flemming, 1939)
- 12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen, 2013)
- Dukes of Hazzard (CBS)
- Gunsmoke (CBS)
- The Wizard of Oz (Victor Flemming, 1939)
- The Andy Griffin Show (CBS)
- Ric Flair
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