R. Eric Thomas. (2020). Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America; Essays. Random House Publishing Group.

R. Eric Thomas. 2020. Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America; Essays. Random House Publishing Group.

R. Eric Thomas, Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America; Essays. Random House Publishing Group, 2020.

R. Eric Thomas. Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America; Essays. Random House Publishing Group, 2020.

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35. • value: books for book clubs
36. • value: gifts for women
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   • fileAs: Thomas, R. Eric
   • bioText: R. Eric Thomas is the bestselling author of Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America, a Lambda Literary Award finalist, and the YA novel Kings of B'more, a Stonewall Honor book. Both books were also featured as Read with Jenna book-club picks on Today. He is also a television writer (Apple TV+’s Dickinson, FX’s Better Things), a Lambda Literary Award-winning playwright, and the long-running host of The Moth in Philadelphia. For four years, he was a senior staff writer at ELLE online, where he wrote the popular “Eric Reads the News” column.
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title

Here for It

fullDescription

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Read with Jenna Book Club Pick as Featured on Today • From the creator of Elle’s “Eric Reads the News,” a heartfelt and hilarious memoir-in-essays about growing up seeing the world differently, finding unexpected hope, and experiencing every awkward, extraordinary stumble along the way.
“Pop culture–obsessed, Sedaris-level laugh-out-loud funny . . . [R. Eric Thomas] is one of my favorite writers.”—Lin-Manuel Miranda, Entertainment Weekly
FINALIST FOR THE LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TEEN VOGUE AND ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY O: The Oprah Magazine • NPR • Marie Claire • Men’s Health
R. Eric Thomas didn’t know he was different until the world told him so. Everywhere he went—whether it was his rich, mostly white, suburban high school, his conservative black church, or his Ivy League college in a big city—he found himself on the outside looking in.
In essays by turns hysterical and heartfelt, Thomas reexamines what it means to be an “other” through the lens of his own life experience. He explores the two worlds of his childhood: the barren urban landscape where his parents’ house was an anomalous bright spot, and the Eden-like school they sent him to in white suburbia. He writes about struggling to reconcile his Christian identity with his sexuality, the exhaustion of code-switching in college, accidentally getting famous on the internet (for the wrong reason), and the surreal experience of covering the 2016 election for Elle online, and the seismic changes that came thereafter. Ultimately, Thomas seeks the answer to these ever more relevant questions: Is the future worth it? Why do we bother when everything seems to be getting worse? As the world continues to shift in unpredictable ways, Thomas finds the answers to these questions by reenvisioning what “normal” means and in the powerful alchemy that occurs when you at last place yourself at the center of your own story.
Here for It will resonate deeply and joyfully with everyone who has ever felt pushed to the margins, struggled with self-acceptance, or wished to shine more brightly in a dark world. Stay here for it—the future may surprise you.

reviews

1. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     October 14, 2019
     With humor, candor, and some self-deprecation, Thomas, a playwright and Elle columnist, delivers a debut essay collection that explores his search for self, love, and stable employment. Growing up in a “broken-down” Baltimore neighborhood while attending a majority-white private school, Thomas, an African-American, learned that living in a bubble isn’t all that bad—his parents economized and worked tirelessly to insulate him from the world’s injustices. Throughout, he deals with imposter syndrome, as when his college acceptance letters include invitations to events for students of color, causing him to ask himself, “Was I the black they were looking for?” Upon beginning at Columbia, he tentatively enters the gay dating scene; questions his Baptist upbringing, in which “being gay was such a sin it wasn’t even spoken of”; and falls in love with postcolonial literature. After college and several jobs, his life changes when a Facebook post in which he “publicly thirsts” after President Obama goes viral, landing him his Elle dream job. Whether dealing with love, breakups, or other setbacks, Thomas is an affable narrator with a penchant for pop culture, funny quips, and charming humility. Agent: Anna Sproul-Latimer, Ross Yoon Agency.

2. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     November 15, 2019
     Culture writer and playwright Thomas humorously explores the intersectionality of his identity and his struggle to find his place in the world. Thomas' voice radiates off the page, providing an instant level of familiarity. He explains the stark experiences of being one of the few minorities in suburban, mostly white, private schools. As a result, the columnist is transparent about grappling with his Blackness. Thomas also shares the details of finding a level of comfort with his sexuality, walking readers through awkward dates, taking his boyfriend home to meet his family, the heartbreak of his first adult relationship, and falling in love and marrying the man of his dreams. Thomas' conservative Christian upbringing both lays the foundation for the book and creates a sounding board for relating to the world. By the end of the memoir-in-essays, Thomas has a clear solace with his spirituality and healthy marriage, though readers may be left wondering if he has found comfort in what it means to be a Black man in society.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

3. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     Starred review from November 1, 2019
     

     Alternately hilarious, touching, reflective, and insightful, this memoir will delight readers, who may find themselves reading sections of the book aloud to anyone within earshot. Thomas, author of the daily humor column "Eric Reads the News" and host of The Moth, has substantial storytelling skills as a playwright, journalist, and humorist. Here, in his first book of essays, Thomas shares stories about his experiences as a gay black Christian man searching for social and spiritual community. Thomas addresses topics as varied as attending an elite private (and mostly white) high school, black hair and the overwhelming hetero-masculinity of many black barbershops, a possibly satanic Elf on the Shelf doll, and anxiously surveilling his university's club for queer and questioning students. Highlights include a funny retelling of the author's experience babysitting in an isolated mansion for kids who might be urine-obsessed class warriors and a poignant reflection on one of his fellow high school students' friendship and life. Readers are carried lightly but persistently along the current of Thomas's writing and may find they finish the book in just one or two sittings. VERDICT A laugh-out-loud memoir that is strongly recommended for everyone.--Monica Howell, Northwestern Health Sciences Univ. Lib., Bloomington, MN

     Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

4. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     September 1, 2019
     

     An award-winning playwright, host of the Moth in Philadelphia and Washington, DC, and author of the daily cheerful politics- and celebrity-shafting column "Eric Reads the News," on Elle.com, Thomas uses this essay collection-cum-memoir to look back with affecting dark humor at never belonging, whether at his mostly white, suburban high school, his conservative black church, or his Ivy League college. Is life worth continuing? Does he find his own story? You gotta read the book.

     Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

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NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Read with Jenna Book Club Pick as Featured on Today • From the creator of Elle’s “Eric Reads the News,” a heartfelt and hilarious memoir-in-essays about growing up seeing the world differently, finding unexpected hope, and experiencing every awkward, extraordinary stumble along the way.
“Pop culture–obsessed, Sedaris-level laugh-out-loud funny . . . [R. Eric Thomas] is one of my favorite writers.”—Lin-Manuel Miranda, Entertainment Weekly
FINALIST FOR THE LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TEEN VOGUE AND ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY O: The Oprah Magazine • NPR • Marie Claire • Men’s Health
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