Everything and Nothing at Once

April 1, 2024
“What does it mean to be a Black man, now?” asks Leon, creative director at the New York Times’s T Brand Studio, in his intimate debut essay collection. In “All Gold Everything,” he contends that the ostentatious gold chains worn by Mr. T, Michael Jordan, and Slick Rick are a “reflection of all the excess we weren’t privileged enough to obtain when we were stolen and brought to the Americas.” Grieving the lost potential of L.A. rapper Nipsey Hussle and other Black men killed in their hometowns by local rivals or the police, Leon laments the “clear and present dangers of staying in the same places where the homies and the 12 know our names” in “Homecoming.” The tender “How to Make a Black Friend” meditates on the support Leon derives from his friendship with Tyron Perryman, whom Leon met after appearing on Perryman’s podcast, Tea and Converse: “The idea that male friendships don’t get to be as special, as intimate, and as warm as other relationships is what leaves so many of us looking for vices that isolate us from the truest, most vulnerable and loving versions of self.” Leon’s lucid prose elevates his perceptive insights into the need for more expansive visions of Black masculinity. This auspicious outing announces Leon as a writer to watch.

May 1, 2024
Essays that circle out from the experience of a Brooklyn-based writer to explore the ramifications of living as a Black man in contemporary America. Raised by an Afro-Caribbean mother who worked hard as a nurse, and now the committed father of two young daughters, Leon, a creative director at the New York Times' T Brand Studio, "wanted to write a book that examined the spectrum of Black masculinity with language that didn't feel linear, or like a copy and paste....I aim to tear apart, to pick, to probe, and to ponder." Deeply immersed in hip-hop--he initially intended to make a living as a rapper--Leon name-drops hip-hop artists with abandon and often without elaboration, which may leave readers without his knowledge adrift, even as they appreciate his energetic prose. Because his style is free flowing, almost stream of consciousness ("I write essays like I write raps"), the author is less effective in essays that call for more tightly reasoned arguments. "Good Art, Bad Art, Black Art" bogs down in truisms like, "Blackness is not considered the norm. Whiteness is." Leon is at his best when he anchors the essays to the details of his own life and allows his natural, quirky sense of humor free rein. In the relatively succinct, slyly comic "Belly," the author meditates on his ambivalence about his body. Over the course of this memorable essay, he describes a history that includes snacking on fried chicken after a long day of work, single fatherhood, remarks about his belly from lovers pleased and displeased by it, and camping in front of the TV eating the pizza his mostly absentee father occasionally provided if he "wasn't drunk or hadn't spent his own SSI check at whichever bar he fell asleep at or around." A sensitive, entertaining, insightful, sometimes verbose collection.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.