In BONE OF THE BONE, National Book Award finalist Sarah Smarsh brings her graceful storytelling and incisive critique to the challenges that define our times --- class division, political fissures, gender inequality, environmental crisis, media bias, the rural-urban gulf. Smarsh, a journalist who grew up on a wheat farm in Kansas and was the first in her family to graduate from college, has long focused on cultural dissonance that many in her industry neglected until recently. Now, this thought-provoking collection of more than 30 of her highly relevant, previously published essays from the past decade (2013–2024) --- ranging from personal narratives to news commentary --- demonstrates a life and a career steeped in the issues that affect our collective future.