Why Roxane Gay Thinks ‘Red at the Bone’ Is Just Like the Movie ‘Speed’

Roxane Gay’s book club is back for its second installment!

In the first meeting, Gay and friends discussed Colson Whitehead’s “The Nickel Boys,” one of the summer’s most widely read and acclaimed novels, about two boys at an abusive reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. For this episode, she picked the next, much-anticipated book by Jacqueline Woodson, “Red at the Bone.”

This time, the “Bad Feminist” author is joined by Elizabeth Acevedo, author of the award-winning YA novel “The Poet X”; Morgan Jerkins, journalist and best-selling author of “This Will Be My Undoing”; and Josh Gondelman, comedian and writer for "Desus & Mero" and author of “Nice Try.”

"Red at the Bone" is the second adult novel for Woodson, who made her name as a YA writer. Set in Brooklyn, it spans several generations of an African-American family, touching on issues of class, parenthood, race, and community. Gay called the book “stunningly written” and praised it for its prose and lush descriptions, but she said she felt like “there were 100 pages missing.”

Watch the video above to find out what her guests thought.

NOTE: It’s OK if you haven’t read the book yet. This video is entirely spoiler-free.