Scan barcode
A review by erinys
Black Boy Joy by Kwame Mbalia
adventurous
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Really enjoyed this little collection, which is mostly short stories with the exception of one brief comic and a prose poem. As the cover states, this is just seventeen expressions of Black Boy Joy from seventeen different Black male or non-binary authors.
The word "Joy" is interpreted in many ways here. A few tales feature Black kids as the heroes of sci-fi adventure--jet-pack races, pocket dimensions, superpowers. There's one fantasy story too, a pretty cool one by P. Djèlí Clark, about a kid born in the Caribbean who has moved to New York and brought with him a creature from Caribbean folklore--a mischievous monster called a Jab.
For the most part, though, the stories that celebrate Black boyhood are just slice-of-life pieces about important moments. Real joy is most often associated with mundane things.
Asking out a girl you like. Making a new friend. Quality time spent with a grandparent, a parent, a sibling, a cousin. Receiving love and support from friends and family at a Gender Reveal Birthday Party. Putting together the perfect outfit for the first day of school.
The lack of restriction on the content really serves this collection well. Some of these are formal stories with a pretty standard structure, but others are more abstract or loose--they are meditations on joy and its wellspring. It says a lot that so many of these stories touch on the same things.
The love and affirmation that Black boys receive from grandparents crops up over and over again. So does the importance of music and dancing as a lifeline to Joy. The image of the family gathering comes up a couple of times too.
All the work here is high quality, but in any collection the reader will have favorites. The story that really stood out for me in this book was "But Also, Jazz" by Julian Randall, which made me cry in a healing sort of way. The story had a lot to say about Joy as the antidote, not to sorrow but to despair. And it had a lot to say about the role of creative people, particularly musicians and poets, as keepers of the flame.
The collection is suitable for both adult readers and younger readers from Middle Grade up. Some of the stories almost feel like Black men as authors reaching out to Black boys as kids, which is a nice thought. Black boys could read this, at minimum, and see themselves as joyful heroes. But if they receive a little wisdom from their older selves--about the importance of family, about making and holding onto friends, about how to win love or hold onto Joy as years pass...that would be the icing on the cake.
I'd recommend this book to almost anyone, and I'm really glad I read it. 'Nuff said.
The word "Joy" is interpreted in many ways here. A few tales feature Black kids as the heroes of sci-fi adventure--jet-pack races, pocket dimensions, superpowers. There's one fantasy story too, a pretty cool one by P. Djèlí Clark, about a kid born in the Caribbean who has moved to New York and brought with him a creature from Caribbean folklore--a mischievous monster called a Jab.
For the most part, though, the stories that celebrate Black boyhood are just slice-of-life pieces about important moments. Real joy is most often associated with mundane things.
Asking out a girl you like. Making a new friend. Quality time spent with a grandparent, a parent, a sibling, a cousin. Receiving love and support from friends and family at a Gender Reveal Birthday Party. Putting together the perfect outfit for the first day of school.
The lack of restriction on the content really serves this collection well. Some of these are formal stories with a pretty standard structure, but others are more abstract or loose--they are meditations on joy and its wellspring. It says a lot that so many of these stories touch on the same things.
The love and affirmation that Black boys receive from grandparents crops up over and over again. So does the importance of music and dancing as a lifeline to Joy. The image of the family gathering comes up a couple of times too.
All the work here is high quality, but in any collection the reader will have favorites. The story that really stood out for me in this book was "But Also, Jazz" by Julian Randall, which made me cry in a healing sort of way. The story had a lot to say about Joy as the antidote, not to sorrow but to despair. And it had a lot to say about the role of creative people, particularly musicians and poets, as keepers of the flame.
The collection is suitable for both adult readers and younger readers from Middle Grade up. Some of the stories almost feel like Black men as authors reaching out to Black boys as kids, which is a nice thought. Black boys could read this, at minimum, and see themselves as joyful heroes. But if they receive a little wisdom from their older selves--about the importance of family, about making and holding onto friends, about how to win love or hold onto Joy as years pass...that would be the icing on the cake.
I'd recommend this book to almost anyone, and I'm really glad I read it. 'Nuff said.