Jackson - Survival math: notes on an all-American family

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Praise for Survival Math

Survival Math tells the story of a young man and a way of life lived against staggering odds; Mitchell Jackson shows us his youth in Portland with an unforgettable mix of sharp humor, wide interrogation, and indelible tragedy. Jacksons mesmerizing voice and style draws you into the survival calculations for millions of American kids and families, revealing a need-to-know reality for all of us. With ravenous curiosity, Jackson explores what hes had to learnand sometimes unlearnabout what it means to be a man and what it means to be human, investigating why and how he survived when many have not.

Piper Kerman, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Orange Is the New Black

Jackson is no mere stylist. His prose is conceived from fabric to fit. Penetrating social critique, rigorous self-examination, epochs and eras attired with a craftsmanship that seems effortless: by every measure, Survival Math is ahead of the curve.

Greg Pardlo, Pulitzer Prizewinning author of Air Traffic and Digest

In Survival Math , Mitchell Jackson turns a familial story into an American one, writing with brutal honesty about himself, and the men and women who shaped him. With a kind of tenderness not reserved for people whove suffered, Jacksons Survival Math explores more than just the highs and lows of his loved ones, he gets at the texture and nuance, the grit and fight of those grasping on to the hope of getting through the worst of it. Put another way: this book is dope. Awash in the kind of stories that easily get written as voyeurism, Jackson turns these lives and his own into an American epic. This kind of memoir as essay is Beardenesque, collaging together his familys lives in a way that, though excavating pain and hurt that easily ruins most, offers something thats revelatory about the calculus it takes to keep going. Jackson reminds us to remember the words of Whitman: Vivas to those who have failed. Written in a prose thats distinctly his own.

Reginald Dwayne Betts, award-winning author of Bastards of the Reagan Era and A Question of Freedom

Mitchell Jacksons Survival Math is riveted by his exacting and tender calculus of each subjects depth and humanity. Each hustle, dodge, and scramble we witness in these pages is anchored in the turbulent sea of American history. Jacksons musings skillfully illuminate the bloodlines, both inherited and earned, that pulse through the body of Americas gang-graffitied carceral state.

Tyehimba Jess, Pulitzer Prizewinning author of Olio

Survival Math should be praised for many reasonsits literary integrity, its cinematic pace, its creativity and candor. But what I find most striking about this work, what I think distinguishes it, is its heart. As a black man in America, I find that there is often pressure to use our stories as performance. To spin them into shaky pedestals where proof of life is professed for a fee. They are ours but often we do not own them. This storythis complex history of an American family that could be representative of manyJackson, undoubtedly, proves is his. It beats like a part of him.

Jason Reynolds, New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of Ghost and Sunny

Mitchell Jacksons Survival Math is telling the truth as youve never heard it. These essays are full of heart and doubt and aching wisdom and fierce beauty. They moved me deeply. This book is hard to read, and hard to put down. Its voice is voices, plural. Its a dirge and a torch song and a family tree and a confessional booth transcript. It will stay with me for a long time, and I wouldnt have it any other way.

Leslie Jamison, New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of The Recovering and Empathy Exams

With the code-switching agility of Toni Cade Bambara and with the lyric intellect of Albert Murray, Survival Math exhibits Mitchell Jackson at his full power, shining a light on the path aheadindeed, helping us to survivein one of the most challenging times in recent American history. This is the salve weve all been searching for when we cover our faces with our hands after reading the latest headlines. Moving between lyric essays; centos; and even epistolary history lessons, personal histories and collective ones, too, theres never been a more authentic chronicling of African American culture. Set in Portland, Oregon, Survival Math chronicles the history of our country from the vantage point of Northeast Portland, but this aint Portlandia . This is as real as it gets, and theres more love storiesmore romantic love, more mother-to-son love, more brother-to-brother lovethan any book should be able to hold, and yet Jackson has figured out the equation to solve for the X on which our lives depend.

A. Van Jordan, award-winning author of The Cineaste

Survival Math is a compassionate meditation on the human costs of this countrys ongoing war on black lives, andmore importantthe methods we employ to endure despite it all. Mitchell Jackson calls on his singular linguistic gifts to craft this story of redemption and maturation with honesty and style.

Angela Flournoy, National Book Awardshortlisted author of The Turner House

After reading dozens of books on race, completing thousands of hours of research, and attending countless conferences, I can confidently say Mitch Jackson is one of the most important voices of our generation. Youll agree after reading Survival Math , the follow-up to his acclaimed The Residue Years . Not only is Survival Math a deeply humanizing page turner, its a timely narrative that gives us a glimpse into the black America we rarely encounter in the mainstream. Jackson has a gift for crafting beautiful sentences and story telling and has brilliantly constructed the type of book that reminds me of why I fell in love with language in the first place. I highly recommend!

D. Watkins, New York Times bestselling author of The Cook Up and The Beast Side

Part testimony, part archive, this book is spliced memory under a microscope. Some fathers. Some sons. Some forsaken and in kind forgiven. This is a memoir of an American family. This story is grit and gilded; a space where individual pasts collide with our collective hopes for Americas future.

DaMaris B. Hill, author of A Bound Woman Is a Dangerous Thing

In Survival Math , Mitchell S. Jackson establishes himself as a master essayist. The complexity of Notes is pastoral yet poignant. Jackson tells an indisputable universal truth that will compel you to question everything you thought you knew about life and living in America. Bravo!

Sanderia Faye, award-winning author of Mourners Bench

In Survival Math , Mitchell Jackson pens an honest, firsthand account of a family caught up in the game. This book is like no other in the singular way that Jackson unpacks their lives with a rare eloquence and intelligence, spinning a tale that is by turns sad, horrifying, illuminating, and uplifting. In short: a dope book by a dope writer.