Use these links to supplement and complement students’ reading of the work and to increase their overall enjoyment of literature. Challenge them to discern parallel themes, engage through visual and aural stimuli, and delve deeper into the thematic possibilities presented by the title.

Recommended Texts for Pairing

Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds

• Reynolds’s novel-in-verse uses similar methods to explore a more difficult side of the Black American experience: cycles of gang violence.
• A useful companion piece when teaching about the diversity of lived Black experience in America
• Explores similar themes, including Confidence and Vulnerability
• Long Way Down on SuperSummary

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

• Woodson’s novel also uses poetic forms to trace a very different Black experience of her upbringing in the American South and Brooklyn.
• Brown Girl Dreaming on SuperSummary

Catalogue of Unabashed Gratitude by Ross Gay

• Ross Gay’s book of poetry explores many similar themes while writing about the modern Black experience, including Confidence and Vulnerability and The Rhythm of Life.
• An excellent choice for students who are interested in the poetic form and are seeking more sophisticated explorations of Blackness and grief

Other Student Resources

Transcript from an Interview with Kwame Alexander