Ta-Nehisi Coates: A Journey of Self-Discovery in "The Beautiful Struggle: A Memoir"

R. Smith: It’s brilliant every time. Unflinching in its honesty, and brave in its story telling. Still my favorite of Coates’s body of work.

United States on Nov 01, 2023

Amazon Customer - Larry: Beautifully written by author Ta-Nehisi Coates! Inspiring and captivating, a young man journey to manhood through his eyes. The cast of parents, friends and associates all fill the pages in this wonderfully written tale.

United States on Feb 24, 2023

Dante: Without a doubt, Coates is my favorite author and this book displays all of his writing and storytelling talents. Focusing on his relationship with his father and his own coming of age revelations, this story pieces together the undertold, overlooked, and misunderstood life of a black boy from Baltimore. A searing and gripping memior that you will not be able to put down. I highly recommend for any black man looking to explore the interiority of black male lives.

United States on Aug 02, 2022

Robert ‘Bob’ Macespera: Ta-Nehisi Coates is the author of one of the best written and more important non-fiction books of the last 25 years: “We Were Eight Years in Power”, his best book so far and which is all in one: an autobiography, a history book, an essay on the American society in the beginnings of the XXI Century, a case for the reparations for the slavery years in America, a cultural self-help manual, a chronicle on the Obama Presidency, a report on the current estate of the racial issues in America; and then else. That important “else” is the two main factors around which Coates have built the ten first years of his career, first as a journalist then as a writer.
This one book, "The Beautiful Struggle" is his autobiography, of sorts.
Born in Baltimore in 1975, Coates grew in a working-class neighbour plagued with gangs and crack in which losing a friend to either of the two was completely normal. His refuge, assisted by both parents (his father was an activist and small-time publisher and his mother a teacher) was the studies, first, and then and more importantly, the library. His personal revelation came from the books – “I was born for the library not for the classroom”,...

United Kingdom on Feb 16, 2021

Case Quarter: sadly, this book is overlooked when the more popular Between the World and Me is discussed. Between the World and Me is the second installment of coates’ memoir, picking up where The Beautiful Struggle leaves off with the young coates preparing for college. the coming of age story of the first memoir brings to mind the progression of language found in joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and the language of place, an urban idiom in coates’ case, evokes the poetry of dylan thomas—a mention of a green hill by coates may be a toast to dylan thomas’ Fern Hill and its catalogue of green things.

the grittiness and toughness of inner-city culture during the 1980s as negotiated by a boy and his siblings and peers isn’t unique to coates’ early years as writer. like several black american writers of his generation, coates acknowledges the importance of hip-hop as a literary form for making sense of black street life as it involves gangs, drugs and promiscuity as early as the pre-teen years. what makes the story his own are his parents, especially the afro-centric teachings of coates’ father, small press publisher of black histories and former black panther....

United States on Nov 18, 2019

-Edward: Beautiful book. Don't really have time for this so FIVE STARS must suffice

Canada on Oct 27, 2019

WL: I actually read The Case for Reparations first and found Ta-Nahisi's writing compelling. Between The World and Me (1day) was next followed by We Were Eight Years in Power. I identify with many of his struggles in this book but my personal preference is his second. I look forward to his next book.

Canada on Mar 23, 2018

B.K.: The story of a black father with kids from various women, trying to grow all of them up successfully despite living in difficult quarters of Baltimore in a time of violence and drugs. The ways of the father are special, however successful. The book is difficult to read (for a European) as it relies on specific local language. However, the story is worth to read.

Germany on Dec 04, 2016

Bear the cat: Having just read 'Between the world and me', I was eager to dive into another piece of Coates' work as he is truly a phenomenal writer. I was happy to see his familiar writing style in this brilliantly crafted memoir, one that is just as hard to put down as his latest national book awarded masterpiece. Coates is truly the new voice of black intellectualism and has a way of conveying important messages that are raw, gripping and unapologetic in nature. Quite frankly, I'm amazed that he has only written two books thus far and eagerly await his next project.

Canada on Feb 13, 2016

Jeff H: I found this book to be an excellent companion to Mr Coates' more recent work  Between the World and Me . The Beautiful Struggle is a lyrical journey through West Baltimore and sheds more detailed light on some of the incidents mentioned in his second book. It shows the many paths a young person could take when faced with the results of multi-generational systemic racism and focuses on the father, the author, and an older brother. Without the social context the book would be an entertaining memoir, by the kind of writer who transports the reader into the story. Action, romance, drama, everything is here. Also a bit of Black Panther Party history, African music study, etc. It is more than just a good book though, considering where we are in this country, considering we have to be told black lives matter, considering the carte blanche granted to the police departments, it is an indispensable view of the other side.

I think both of these books should be required reading for people like me, that is people who have to check the white, non-hispanic box on surveys. While reading a couple (or a hundred) books will never place you in the shoes of someone who has experienced the...

United States on Feb 09, 2016