Coates is an incredible writer who conveys his fear, exhaustion, and nostalgia with elegance. Between the World and Me has so many thoughtful, beautifully-worded passages that I ended up highlighting practically half the book, even though I didn't agree with everything he said. 
 His lack of belief in God refuses to allow him gloss over the horror of past tragedies, and emphasizes the importance of actions in the here and now: 
 "You must struggle to truly remember this past in all its nuance, error, and humanity. You must resist the common urge toward the comforting narrative of divine law, toward fairy tales that imply some irrepressible justice. The enslaved were not bricks in your road, and their lives were not chapters in your redemptive history. They were people turned to fuel for the American machine. Enslavement was not destined to end, and it is wrong to claim our present circumstance--no matter how improved--as the redemption for the lives of people who never asked for the posthumous, untouchable glory of dying for their children." 
 Things I wasn't so sure about: 
 - A woman pushes your kid when you're walking around in NYC, and it's automatically because of racism? Hmm. 
 - A (black) policeman killed your college acquaintance years ago, so that makes it OK to rejoice in the many deaths of 9/11 first responders? That seems... disconnected.