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Established 2016
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  • What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Blacker: A Memoir in Essays by Damon Young

What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Blacker: A Memoir in Essays by Damon Young

SKU: 9780062684318
$17.99
$17.99
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A Finalist for the NAACP Image Award

Longlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay

An NPR Best Book of the Year

A Washington Independent Review of Books Favorite of the Year


From the cofounder of VerySmartBrothas.com, and one of the most read writers on race and culture at work today, a provocative and humorous memoir-in-essays that explores the absurdities and anxieties of being Black in America


For Damon Young, existing while Black is an extreme sport. The act of possessing black skin while searching for space to breathe in America is enough to induce a ceaseless state of angst where questions such as “How should I react here, as a professional black person?” and “Will this white person’s potato salad kill me?” are forever relevant.


What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker chronicles Young’s efforts to survive while battling and making sense of the various neuroses his country has given him.


It’s a condition that’s sometimes stretched to absurd limits: creating the farce where, as a teen, he wished for a white person to call him a racial slur just so he could fight him and have a great story about it; provoking the angst that made him question if “being straight” was something he could practice and get better at, like a crossover dribble; and generating the surreal experience of watching his Pittsburgh neighborhood getrify from predominantly Black to “Portlandia . . . but with Pierogies.” 


And, at its most devastating, it provides him reason to believe that his mother would be alive today if she were white.


From one of our most respected cultural observers, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker is a hilarious and honest debut that is both a celebration of the idiosyncrasies and distinctions of Blackness and a critique of white supremacy and how we define masculinity.

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  • About
    • Meet the Staff
    • FAQ for Customers
    • Returns Policy
    • Newsletter Sign Up
    • Employment
    • Contact Us
  • Photo Gallery
  • Blog
    • Reviews
  • Southern Bestseller List
    • Foggy Pine Books Monthly Bestsellers
    • 2020 Bestseller List
    • 2020 Southern Book Prize Winners
  • Programs
    • Free Books for Boone >
      • FBFB Support
    • 2021 Reading Challenge
    • Book Clubs >
      • Fantasy & Science Fiction Book Club
      • Foggy Pine Book Club
    • Community Book Club Partnership
    • Loyalty & Discount Programs
    • For Authors >
      • Local Authors
      • Southern Authors
    • Used Books
    • Conference Room Rental
  • Events
  • Shop
    • Shop Our Shelves
    • Mystery Box
    • Found in the Fog Subscription Box
    • Audiobooks
    • Gift Cards
    • Reading Lists >
      • Antiracist Reading List
      • Queer Literature Reading List
      • Summer Reading
    • Donation & Tip Jar
    • Products