As you know, we’re fond of bringing stories to light, those that have been stashed away or buried for years until a history detective, a determined researcher, or an individual rooting around in an attic or basement trunk finds something unusual, perhaps a photograph or diary, and decides to pursue it. Sometimes a gem is hidden not in a trunk but in a book.

Not long ago I read Best African American Essays 2009, edited by the writer and cultural critic Gerald Early, and guest edited by Debra J. Dickerson. The first in what will be a series, the anthology is one I just hated to have end. Among the many stellar pieces was one by Mark Anthony Neal, titled In his “Bodies in Pain.” I learned about Linda Jones, the sad, soulful singer from Newark, New Jersey, who would have surely gone on to greatness in the 1960s and 1970s had she not died young. What really caught my attention was this sentence: “Linda Jones’s music demanded an emotional investment—specifically, in the lives of Black women—that mainstream audiences, I’d like to argue, were likely incapable of making at the time.”

This intrigued me. I consider myself pretty well-schooled in women entertainers of color from Jones’s era, yet I had never heard of her, and I didn’t recognize the songs that Neal cited: “That’s When I’ll Stop Loving You,” “For Your Precious Love,” “Things I’ve Been Through” and “Hypnotized,” which reached No. 26 on Billboard’s black albums chart.

After finishing the essay I went online and downloaded a couple dozen of Jones’s songs. Her voice—potent, rich, full of anguish, as well as passion, anger, and grown-up love—knocked me out. “Each performance,” writes Neal, “was an attempt to grasp a sliver of the humanity that was slowly departing from her.” I could hear those attempts in every note.

I might have discovered Linda Jones at some time in the future, or never at all. The jewel of an essay that brought me to her taught me that there is always something more to learn about, and that sometimes we just stumble upon new and interesting things.

Although I chose “Bodies in Pain” to write about here, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention a few essays unrelated to music that stood out in the anthology: Chimamanda Ngoi Adichie’s “Real Food,” Jamaica Kincaid’s “Dances With Daffodils,” Jill Nelson’s “Modern-Day Mammy?,” and Emily Raboteau’s “Searching for Zion.” This last piece is a soulful account of Raboteau’s friendship with a Jewish girl, the author’s trip to Israel to visit her, and her immersion into the ancient world, where who owns what and who belongs where are questions for the ages that are asked and answered minute by minute.

I also invite you to read Gerald Early’s equally engaging Best African American Fiction 2009, with guest editor E. Lynn Harris. I’ve burned through it, too.

AUDREY M. PETERSON, Editor