In a book of rare candor and vitality, the revered journalist and national best selling author of The Rage of a Privileged Class probes the daunting circumstances and ambivalent attitudes of black men in today's America.

On the strength of his previous books and columns, Newsweek contributing editor Ellis Cose has already staked a reputation as one of America's premier thinkers and boldest writers. Now, with The Envy of the World, Cose demonstrates that he is also an author of extraordinary empathy and pragmatism, delivering the most lucid, personal, and acclaimed book of his career.

The Envy of the World details, with the aid of real-world anecdotes, the particular ways black men come to internalize the disdain and fear directed at them by American society. Even as he frankly contends with such dire issues as drug abuse, incarceration, criminal activity, misogyny, and chronic economic inequality, Cose also considers the significance of the progress that has been made, particularly in recent decades. Featuring the comments and experiences of men who represent the vast spectrum of black experience, from the first African-American to head a Fortune 500 company and the first black grandmaster of chess, to unknown drug dealers and jailed youths, The Envy of the World challenges us in careful, crystalline prose to rethink who we are and what we've become as a society