11/19/18 @9:45 AM ET - Janeane spoke with Kiese Laymon, author of the brilliant and candid memoir HEAVY

Kiese Laymon's memoir, HEAVY, named one of the 2018 KIRKUS PRIZE FINALIST and just reviewed in the New York Times Book Review *Shortlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal and Kirkus Prize Finalist* In this powerful and provocative memoir, genre-bending essayist and novelist Kiese Laymon explores what the weight of a lifetime of secrets, lies, and deception does to a black body, a black family, and a nation teetering on the brink of moral collapse. Kiese Laymon is a fearless writer. In his essays, personal stories combine with piercing intellect to reflect both on the state of American society and on his experiences with abuse, which conjure conflicted feelings of shame, joy, confusion and humiliation. Laymon invites us to consider the consequences of growing up in a nation wholly obsessed with progress yet wholly disinterested in the messy work of reckoning with where we’ve been.