A profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a black father for his son, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward.

At every stage of his life, Coates has sought in his explorations of history answers to the mysteries that surrounded him-- most urgently, why he, and other black people he knew, seemed to live in fear. In this book he takes readers through America's history of race and its contemporary resonances through a series of awakenings-- moments when he discovered some new truth about our long, tangled history of race.