Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
This timely and important book is an essay on race and racism in America told in the form of a letter to the author’s teenage son. Coates frames the experience of racism in the most powerful way: it is the attempt by the state, or other powers that would be, to take possession of the black body, to lash it, to rape it, to reduce it to something "sexual and obscene." It is the best, most poignant account of what it means to be black in today's America. Between the World and Me should be required reading in all American high schools and colleges, and any citizen (especially those who consider themselves white) who really cares about this country should read it too. It helps that it's written to a teenager, because when it comes to growing up and facing racism, America is barely in its teens. – Kenneth Loosli