Making Michael Arceneaux's I Don't Want to Die Poor required reading in high schools across the country would help a lot of young people think twice about the promise that going to college at any cost is the only path to upward social mobility.

Journalist and cultural critic Arceneaux...offers another unflinchingly smart and wickedly funny collection of essays.

...at its best when Arceneaux discusses the day-to-day travails of struggling with the debt burden ...I Don’t Want to Die Poor is not without its flaws. It has its clumsy patches, and the book is full of slang and pop culture references which make it very much of the moment, but which may not age well. Arceneaux also points out that he knows the book will attract criticism from those who think he should have made other, less expensive choices in the past. That brand of criticism is precisely the point: I Don’t Want to Die Poor is an excellent critique of the way that our society encourages people to try for more, and then punishes them for doing so..

...a candid study of the hydra-like power of student loan debt and, as a result, the rising cost of freedom.

Throughout these essays, Arceneaux passionately and candidly displays his political and racial awareness alongside sharp opinions on popular culture, marijuana use, Instagram, and depression. At times, the author’s writing comes off as overindulgent and peevish, much more so than in his previous book. He’s at his strongest when honestly evaluating the merciless harassment of robocalls and debt collectors who called him (and his mother, who co-signed many of his loans) early mornings and late nights while he struggled to stay afloat with writing gigs, some of which went unpaid for months.

In an often funny, and sometimes moving, collection of essays, Arceneaux...explores a defining decision in his life: financing his Howard University communications degree through private student loans.