Long Way Down

Use these links to supplement and complement students’ reading of the work and to increase their overall enjoyment of literature. Challenge them to discern parallel themes, engage through visual and aural stimuli, and delve deeper into the thematic possibilities presented by the title.

Recommended Texts for Pairing

Ghost by Jason Reynolds

• Reynolds’ novel is a more traditional narrative approach to similar thematic content.
• Ghost on SuperSummary

The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

• Acevedo’s National Book Award winner traces a young woman’s love of slam poetry in Harlem.
• The Poet X on SuperSummary

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

• Woodson’s novel also uses poetic forms to trace a very different Black experience of her upbringing in the American South and Brooklyn.
• a useful companion piece when teaching about the diversity of lived Black experience in America
• Brown Girl Dreaming on SuperSummary

Other Student Resources

In ‘Long Way Down,’ the Ghosts of Gun Violence Chill a Plan for Revenge

• David Greene’s interview of Jason Reynolds provides key insights into the author’s method and close association with the themes of the book.
• touches on Toxic Masculinity and Vulnerability and Cycles of Violence