LONG WAY DOWN by Jason Reynolds

LONG WAY DOWN is a novel you’ll read in a day and think about for a year. Told in free verse, it’s a powerful story that covers only sixty seconds—the time it takes a fifteen-year-old named Will to decide to avenge his older brother’s death. Over the course of a single elevator ride, Will confronts the ghosts of his neighborhood floor by floor, as they slowly help him piece together the cycle of violence that he and his lost brother are surrounded by.

Author Jason Reynolds has won a Newberry Honor, multiple Coretta Scott King awards, and an NAACP image award, yet he’d never read a full novel until he was 17. He’s both the Library of Congress’ National Ambassador for Youth Literature and someone whose work is regularly banned by local school districts. His name is worth remembering, because generations after us will remember him. And this book is worth reading, because I know I’ll never forget it.

— Recommended by Stephen