{"product_id":"my-soul-looks-back-9781501125928","title":"My Soul Looks Back","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eIn this captivating new memoir, award-winning writer Jessica B. Harris recalls her youth “surrounded by some of the most famous creative minds of the seventies and eighties…James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Nina Simone” (\u003ci\u003eNew York \u003c\/i\u003emagazine)—in a vibrant, lost era of New York City.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the Technicolor glow of the early seventies, Jessica B. Harris debated, celebrated, and danced her way from the jazz clubs of the Manhattan’s West Side to the restaurants of Greenwich Village, living out her buoyant youth alongside the great minds of the day—luminaries like Maya Angelou, James Baldwin, and Toni Morrison. \u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back \u003c\/i\u003eis her tribute to that fascinating social circle and their shared commitment to activism, intellectual engagement, and each other.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eWith “simmering warmth” (\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e), Harris paints evocative portraits of her illustrious friends: Baldwin as he read aloud an early\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"[N]ever, to this reader, uninteresting ... “My Soul Looks Back” has a simmering warmth.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Eloquent and infinitely delightful.\"\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e—Essence\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Harris intimately reflects on her friendships with these fascinating individuals and their social circle, capturing an era that was vibrant with creativity, art, activism, and intellectual life.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBuzzfeed\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back\u003c\/i\u003e is a great New York City memoir; I thought of James Wolcott’s \u003ci\u003eLucking Out\u003c\/i\u003e and Patti Smith’s \u003ci\u003eJust Kids\u003c\/i\u003e, both documents of the city in the seventies, as well as books from an earlier New York, like Anatole Broyard’s \u003ci\u003eKafka Was the Rage\u003c\/i\u003e and Mary Cantwell’s \u003ci\u003eManhattan,\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eWhen I Was Young \u003c\/i\u003e... I finished the book eager to find a noisy neighborhood restaurant where the wine is served in mismatched glasses and the specials are under twenty dollars.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eEpicurious\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"[Harris] is a born storyteller and her memoir is a joy to read—a beautiful portrait of a remarkable era.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCharleston Gazette-Mail\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A friend of celebrated authors Maya Angelou and James Baldwin, Harris was part of a fascinating social circle in the early ’70s. She shares a unique look at their lives and work, while also opening up about her own career and relationship with one of Baldwin’s colleagues. As a bonus, each chapter has a related recipe.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBustle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Harris's culinary expertise winds through her stories, and each chapter ends with a recipe, including her mother's Sunday roast chicken and Goujonnettes de Sole with Ersatz Sauce Gribiche, inspired by her favorite after-opera meal. No doubt a few of Harris's friends have been saying for years that she had to write this memoir, and if so, they were right.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eShelf Awareness\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"This is a lively, entertaining, and informative recounting of a time and place that shaped and greatly enriched American culture.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Scenic and engaging, \u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back \u003c\/i\u003erecounts the years author Jessica B. Harris spent on the periphery of a circle of friends that included literary powerhouses James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, and Toni Morrison. The memoir spans the globe and several decades to describe the fascinating group.\"\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e—\u003cb\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Come for the insight into the circle of friends that first resolved around James Baldwin, then shifted orbit to revolve around Maya Angelou. Stay because you're enraptured by the candid, passionate woman narrating from the periphery. This is an intimate look at an inner circle of Black writers, scholars, and glamazons moving through the middle of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first, told with bold tenderness by a woman who grew up in their company, under their gaze.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003eAlice Randall, author of \u003ci\u003eAda's Rules \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Wind Done Gone\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"At table, before a lectern, or on the page, no matter where we encounter Jessica B. Harris, she commands our attention. \u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back\u003c\/i\u003e, her most intimate book, showcases an era when the Black artistic elite flowered and Jessica, along with her love Sam Floyd, lunched with Maya Angelou in California, shared popcorn with James Baldwin in the South of France, and nurtured a social aesthetic that spangled, all too briefly, beneath the kliegs.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003eJohn T. Edge, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Potlikker Papers: A Food History of the Modern South\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"In \u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back, \u003c\/i\u003eJessica Harris uses her amazing griot voice and exquisite writing skills to take the reader with her on a serendipitous journey filled with everything from a sampling of her unique culinary creations to up-close-and-personal looks at some of the world's most renowned arists—from James Baldwin, aka Jimmy, to the inner circle she was allowed into by her mysterious lover, Sam. A tour de force that holds its own among the great memoirs of all time.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003eCharlayne Hunter-Gault, Emmy Award-winning journalist and author of \u003ci\u003eIn My Place\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Jessica Harris takes you on a magical journey through the streets of New York, through a distinctive and historical era.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003ePat Mikell, of Mikell's jazz club\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I devoured Jessica B. Harris's \u003ci\u003eMy Soul Looks Back \u003c\/i\u003eas though it were one of the feasts she describes in its pages—brimming with food, wine, wit, and wisdom. This luminouus and illuminating memoir is also a song of love and praise to the heyday of bohemian, intellectual New York, and especially to the African American arts and literature community that has supplied the city with so much of its brilliance and vibrancy.\"\u003cbr\u003e —\u003cb\u003eRosie Schaap, author of \u003ci\u003eDrinking with Men\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e","brand":"Simon \u0026 Schuster","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49531336720727,"sku":"9781501125928","price":16.42,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781501125928.jpg?v=1731882710","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/my-soul-looks-back-9781501125928","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}