JM Holmes' debut is a biting thing. It's a collection of contemporary stories that center on four young black men in Rhode Island; these tales connect, building themselves into a novel. Expertly crafted and shudderingly raw, HOW ARE YOU GOING TO SAVE YOURSELF explores the intersections of race, class, gender and desire through powerful voices and messy, unforgettable characters.

The book follows Dub, Rolls, Rye and Gio (especially the latter) as they navigate a decade of friendship and falling apart. They in turn support each other, save each other, bring out the very worst in each other, and pose to each other. Holmes traces ropes of violence and insecurity, weaves them through drugs, sex and music, and lets us watch them tangle.

"HOW ARE YOU GOING TO SAVE YOURSELF explores the intersections of race, class, gender and desire through powerful voices and messy, unforgettable characters."

HOW ARE YOU GOING TO SAVE YOURSELF sits in your mouth and leaves a taste like blood, a push like a bruise. It curdles in your stomach, but you can't stop swaying to its rhythm. You realize this is terrifying, and familiar.

Holmes builds so much joy and humor into these pages. At the same time, reading as a mixed-race, non-black woman, there are moments here that I don't feel I can speak to because I'm almost certainly missing something, and ones that truly horrified me. Much of the discomfort felt deliberate, but some I wasn't sure what to do with. Holmes leads you to follow these men, their motivations and their messiness, and you do, buoyed along by his vibrant rhythms of writing. Then they commit acts of a common sort of violence against women that you stop, short, in disbelief…then disappointment, revulsion and recognition.

There were times when I needed to put it down, step back and breathe. I was able to pick it back up again because Holmes knew exactly what he was doing and how, dragging into the light the pathetic, masochistic, unimaginable cruelty of toxic masculinity.