What we're reading: Wesley Lowery, Mel Campbell and Anthony Morris

Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.


Bronte Coates is reading They Can’t Kill Us All by Wesley Lowery

They Can’t Kill Us All is a compact, fiercely galvanising read about the birth of the Black Lives Matter protest movement. Wesley Lowery is singularly placed to tell this story. Reporting for The Washington Post, he was on the streets during the initial days of the Ferguson protests (following the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by white police officer Darren Wilson), and was one of the first journalists to be imprisoned for covering the events. He continued to report on the evolution of the movement over the following months and played a key role in The Washington Post’s Fatal Force project – a Pulitzer Prize-winning database that tracks police shootings in America. They Can’t Kill Us All is his memoir of this time, compiled from his haphazard and extensive notes. Lowery’s book provides insight into an integral moment of our very recent history, and much-needed context as to the role this movement is playing today – and what it could become in the future.

I can also highly recommend Jill Leovy’s Ghettoside, which explores similar themes of police violence and endemic racism in America. I read it last year and it was a revelation.


Ellen Cregan is reading The Hot Guy by Mel Campbell and Anthony Morris

I’ve just finished reading the hilarious rom-com, The Hot Guy. This isn’t something I’d normally pick up, but it came highly recommended by a trustworthy source. This book is the perfect antidote for too much serious reading – the jokes are perfectly daggy and it often had me giggling out loud. The terrifying antics of the ‘League’ (a facebook group devoted to stalking the titular ‘hot guy’, Adam) were particularly amusing. Their dedication to Adam’s hotness incites kidnapping, pizza theft, and a drunken stampede. It’s also packed with great film references. I’m not really a film person, so some of these went over my head, but there were plenty of gags about cinematic tropes that had even me laughing. All of the characters totally over the top, but somehow still so relatable. Campbell and Morris work within well known stereotypes (cat-loving spinsters, women with shambolic man-child boyfriends, etc) but the hyperbole they bring to each stops the cliches from feeling stale. This is a really wonderful read that is lighthearted, quite silly and very entertaining.


Jo Case is reading The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr

I’ve been carrying a post-it covered copy of Mary Karr’s The Art of Memoir around with me for the past week. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m a colossal bore on the subject of Karr’s trilogy of memoirs (The Liar’s Club, Cherry and Lit). The first two books – often credited with launching memoir as a popular genre – are heartbreaking, funny, insightful, beautifully felt accounts of a chaotic Texas childhood, with unstable but charismatic parents, and a family legacy of alcoholism. The third book, Lit, follows the development of her creative career, with mentors like Tobias Wolff and teacher Raymond Carver.

I’m teaching memoir this year, and have been re-reading The Art of Memoir once a month, before I teach. It’s packed with wisdom, like: ‘We can accept anything from a memoirist but deceit, which is – almost always – a shallow person’s lack of self-knowledge.’ I highly recommend it to anyone writing memoir, beginner or not. And if you want to see whether Karr’s approach works for you, you’ll get a good sense from her Paris Review interview, The Art of Memoir, No. 1.

Cover image for The Hot Guy

The Hot Guy

Mel Campbell,Anthony Morris

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