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Essays on Lip Service
by Tajja Isen
A fearless and darkly comic essay collection about race, justice, and the limits of good intentions.
In this stunning debut collection, Catapult editor-in-chief and award-winning voice actor Tajja Isen explores the absurdity of living in a world that has grown fluent in the language of social justice but doesn't always follow through.
These nine daring essays explore the sometimes troubling and often awkward nature of that discord. Some of My Best Friends takes on the cartoon industry's pivot away from colorblind casting, the pursuit of diverse representation in the literary world, the law's refusal to see inequality, and the cozy fictions of nationalism. Isen deftly examines the quick, cosmetic fixes society makes to address systemic problems, and reveals the unexpected ways they can misfire.
In the spirit of Zadie Smith, Cathy Park Hong, and Jia Tolentino, Isen interlaces cultural criticism with her lived experience to explore the gaps between what we say and what we do, what we do and what we value, what we value and what we demand.
"[A] stellar debut collection...this book shows a bracing willingness to tackle sensitive issues that others often sweep under a rug. Fresh and intelligent critiques of popular North American ideas about race and gender." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Isen scrutinizes society's attempts to bandage over such issues as race and gender inequality in her powerful debut. Isen's voice is both wry and sensitive as she fearlessly lays out the limits of talk in solving inequality; fans of sharp cultural criticism, take note." - Publishers Weekly
"Beautifully written, wildly funny, and whip smart, the essays in Some of My Best Friends are among the best I've ever read. Tajja Isen is unafraid to ask deep questions and embrace their messy answers. She's one hell of a writer." - Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author of Mostly Dead Things and With Teeth
"Isen understands that our shared future demands we expose and call out wasted time, hollow gestures, and empty words. Some of My Best Friends is an inspiring, determined work of personal narrative and cultural criticism." - Saeed Jones, author of How We Fight for Our Lives
"The essays in this book dazzle stylistically, thrill intellectually and flip the finger to the many ways North America pretends to talk about racial experiences. Isen is a provocateur of the first order. Her wit and wisdom capture the current moment and soar above it." - Kamal Al-Solaylee, author of Return and Brown
This information about Some of My Best Friends was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Tajja Isen is a writer, editor, and voice actor. Her essays and criticism have appeared in dozens of outlets across the US and Canada. She is the editor-in-chief for Catapult magazine, the former digital editor for The Walrus, and has also edited for Electric Literature. She is the coeditor of the essay anthology The World As We Knew It: Dispatches from a Changing Climate. A voice actor for over two decades, Tajja can be heard on such animated shows as Atomic Betty, The Berenstain Bears, Super Why!, Go Dog Go, Jane and the Dragon, and many others.
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