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Anand Giridharadas

@anandwrites

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MAN IN THE MIRROR — on a subway tragedy and the struggle for humanity and belonging in this age — is out now.

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I am blown away by this review from Scott Turow in The New York Times. I couldn’t have asked for a more rigorous treatment of my work. This guy was on my bookshelf when I was a teenager still dreaming of becoming a writer. The headline alone, taken in before 6 a.m. on my birthday, almost made me fall over. It is a powerful feeling when someone sees what you were trying to do. And even as Turow voices concerns about the intensity of my empathy for Jordan Neely and my fairness to Daniel Penny, I have heard from others a reticence about a book that “humanizes the white guy.” I understand both reactions and will try to take these criticisms with grace because, really, I was trying to humanize everyone. It’s for others to judge if the boat tilts too far this way or that way. But that was my project, that was the goal, and I am moved beyond measure to see that undertaking reflected in these pages that I revere.

From the review:

“This book — often brilliant, occasionally frustrating — is an extraordinarily wide-ranging investigation of the circumstances underlying a lethal incident that occurred on a northbound F train on May 1, 2023…

“The remarkable scope of this book is demonstrated in a series of involving portraits, including of unhoused New Yorkers, whose meager possessions are routinely swept away in police raids but who nevertheless reappear on the same sidewalks hours later; of touchingly dedicated outreach workers who try to lead the homeless to safety; and of public health figures butting heads over policy….

“Giridharadas’s empathy for Neely is, understandably, intense. In describing the painstaking autopsy conducted by the city after Neely’s death, he writes, “Here was a body that had been variously neglected, hounded, tossed about and given the runaround by the City of New York for most of its life.” Where, he goes on, was such care for Neely “when the systems of schooling and foster care and shelters and mental health and prisons were being designed and funded?”…

“This is an exhaustively reported book by a ferociously talented writer.” by @anandwrites

I’m thrilled to announce the MAN IN THE MIRROR book tour!

I’m so excited to come meet you and share with you something I have worked harder on and am prouder of than any other thing I have made.

Sarah McNally calls MAN IN THE MIRROR the best New York book since THE POWER BROKER — but it’s also a journey to the heart of America in this moment. George Packer calls it novelistic. Andrew Solomon calls it morally complex at a time when the culture pushes us the other way. Adrian Nicole LeBlanc calls it a map of the age.

I also think, though I’m biased, that it’s a propulsive, page-turning story that will make you feel more alive and more connected to our common humanity.

This fall, I’m coming to a city near you, and I’d love to meet you, learn from you, take silly pictures and videos with you, and share this work.

Find tickets and other info at my website at ANAND.LY (link also in bio).

Swipe for photos from book tours past.

And reply TOUR if you want me to DM you a link to ticket info. by @anandwrites

The legendary Sarah McNally something about MAN IN THE MIRROR that I’m still trying to process:

“The best New York book since The Power Broker.”

Coming from Sarah — and from @mcnallyjackson — that means more to me than I can say.

Thank you, Sarah. by @anandwrites

I just have to get this off my chest by @anandwrites

Don’t miss last week’s episode of The Lede, in which author @anandwrites joins @faisalalyafai to discuss Jordan Neely’s 2023 death on a New York subway, widespread disillusionment with protective institutions in America, and ways to address national polarization, as explored in his new book, “Man in the Mirror.”

🎙️ Hosted by Faisal Al Yafai, featuring Anand Giridharadas
🎧 Produced by Finbar Anderson
Listen to the full episode: https://linktr.ee/theledepodcast
#anandgiridharadas #jordanneely #uspolitics #polarization by @anandwrites

AI is being forced on us so aggressively that I sometimes wonder if they overplayed their hand and are going to inspire a humanist renaissance. by @anandwrites

It’s election time, so once again cities are being maligned in American life as dens of iniquity and wastelands of disorder. Last night at the Brooklyn Public Library, I congratulated everyone for making it there through the gauntlet of these mean streets, and I talked about how cities should stand up for themselves: far from being the places so often caricatured, they have the challenges they do in part because they are holding the weight of so much intolerance and cruelty in other parts of this country, holding so many people who tried and failed to be accepted and cared for elsewhere. by @anandwrites

When Jordan Neely was killed by Daniel Penny on a New York City subway on May 1, 2023, it immediately became a famous case of a chokehold death. What few knew then was that, a decade and a half earlier, Neely‘s mother, Christie, had been killed by exactly the same cause of death, compression of the neck, her death ruled on by the same medical examiner’s office that would assess her son‘s death years later. What is even more striking is that, during the trial, Jordan Neely was made to testify against his mother‘s boyfriend, who was accused of the murder. And the boyfriend, serving as his own representative, personally cross-examined the son of the woman he was accused of killing.

Learn more about my reporting and my book, MAN IN THE MIRROR, in my conversation with Tonya Mosley on NPR’s Fresh Air. by @anandwrites

Jordan Neely, a Black unhoused man in crisis, was frightening fellow passengers on the New York City subway. A white former Marine named Daniel Penny put Neely into a chokehold, killing him. Journalist Anand Giridharadas investigates the incident, and what it reveals about American society in Man in the Mirror. He spoke with @tonyatalks. by @anandwrites

Signing these books at the Barnes & Noble in Union Square is perhaps the right time to make a confession. When my first book, INDIA CALLING, came out, @priyaparker and I excitedly went to this location to see my book displayed front and center in this iconic store. It was quite strange, then, to discover that it was neither front nor center, and very possibly not even in the store. We looked and we looked. Even my well-honed investigative skills could not aid me to locate this book. And then we found it on an extremely high floor, a single copy or maybe two, sandwiched between other titles in a category I catastrophizingly remember as “Niche Indian-themed books you probably don’t want to read.” (In fact, as the picture from back then attests, it was “India History.”) So we did what any normal people would do in that situation: we took the book or two, brought it all the way downstairs, and displayed it most prominently on the front table. Thank you, @bnunionsqnyc, for this beautiful display that makes me not have to risk arrest. All these books are now signed, ready for you. by @anandwrites

Stopped to sign some stock at the @barnesandnoble on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. Go get yours from these very charming booksellers. by @anandwrites

In Man in the Mirror, a detailed investigation into the Jordan Neely and Daniel Penny case, Anand Giridharadas explores the stories and divisions that shape our understanding of one another.
In his conversation with @clairehoffman3000, he reflected on the shared pain beneath our political differences and how recognizing it could bring us closer together.
Head to our Substack to watch the full conversation! by @anandwrites