Thick and Other Essays
2019
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The story
Thick: And Other Essays is a collection of essays by the American sociologist Tressie McMillan Cottom. The book explores a range of topics, including black womanhood, body image, and McMillan Cottom's experience as a Southern black woman academic. Published in 2019 by The New Press, Thick was a finalist for that year's National Book Award.
What it’s like
Sharp, conversational first-person essays with the rhythm of a long talk over coffee: analytical and funny, often dry and unsparing, moving between a pointed aside and a carefully built argument. The prose is confident and quotable, switching easily between memoir, cultural criticism, and sociological observation, with Southern cadences and a vivid sense of ordinary life in small towns, classrooms, and hair salons. Each essay has a clear shape and a rising thought, so the collection suits reading one piece at a time in a quiet hour, though the sustained voice rewards reading straight through. The emotional register runs from wry to tender to angry, and the sustained feeling is one of clear-eyed self-possession rather than comfort. Some pieces deal with racism, misogyny, poverty, and institutional cruelty, and sexual content appears in frank discussion of desire and bodies, but there is no violence or gore, and the hardest material is handled through reflection rather than spectacle. It suits readers who want incisive, intimate writing about Black womanhood, beauty norms, and academia, and who enjoy essays that argue as well as confide.
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