I want to start by saying, I originally thought I wasn't really the target audience for this book, and I was emphatically wrong. My main concern was "I'm a white woman, how am I supposed to feel about this book?" and the issue with that line of thinking is that it wasn't written for MY feelings. It was written for my EDUCATION.
Kevin is an undergrad student at Columbia University in 1968. On the heels of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Kevin is enraged with his environment and Columbia's land grabbing in Harlem. Along with his classmates, the Black students of Columbia engage in an impromptu sit-in protest to fight for their education being more inclusive and against the Columbia gym construction that threatens Morningside Park.
Gibran is a high school senior at Lakeside Academy in 1995. Trying to survive his last year of high school when he's already gotten early admission to Howard is all he can focus on, but when the systemic racism becomes too much, Gibran feels he must fight for his life in the school. When the school principal denies a Day of Absence in observance of the Million Man March, Gibran has had enough and starts his fight for revolution.
Two men, thirty years apart, fighting for revolution in different ways and both working their way to self-destruction without realizing it. Outside influences and family are pulling them in two different directions. They're at risk of alienating their family and friends and becoming "troublemakers" thus further hardening their fight.
This book taught me about civil rights fights I learned nothing about in school at any point in my life. I met civil rights leaders I've never heard about, specifically Stockley Carmichael, now Kwame Ture, and H. Rap Brown, now Jamil al-Amin. The Columbia protests were fascinating to me because reading about the white students at the beginning of the sit-in acting like it's a party instead of protest was entirely relatable. You don't belong there if you aren't willing to act right.
My overall feelings on this book was that I was blown away. An excellent historical fiction story that put you IN the action. I truly believe this would be an amazing course book for American Literature classes in middle or high school. The conversations an educator could lead on this book are endless. The conversations started in Gibran's course were enough to get me thinking.
I highly recommend this book to everyone, all ages, all races, all creeds. I learned so much and I have grown for having read this.
Thank you, Ms. Allen, for this truly eye-opening experience.
Kevin is an undergrad student at Columbia University in 1968. On the heels of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Kevin is enraged with his environment and Columbia's land grabbing in Harlem. Along with his classmates, the Black students of Columbia engage in an impromptu sit-in protest to fight for their education being more inclusive and against the Columbia gym construction that threatens Morningside Park.
Gibran is a high school senior at Lakeside Academy in 1995. Trying to survive his last year of high school when he's already gotten early admission to Howard is all he can focus on, but when the systemic racism becomes too much, Gibran feels he must fight for his life in the school. When the school principal denies a Day of Absence in observance of the Million Man March, Gibran has had enough and starts his fight for revolution.
Two men, thirty years apart, fighting for revolution in different ways and both working their way to self-destruction without realizing it. Outside influences and family are pulling them in two different directions. They're at risk of alienating their family and friends and becoming "troublemakers" thus further hardening their fight.
This book taught me about civil rights fights I learned nothing about in school at any point in my life. I met civil rights leaders I've never heard about, specifically Stockley Carmichael, now Kwame Ture, and H. Rap Brown, now Jamil al-Amin. The Columbia protests were fascinating to me because reading about the white students at the beginning of the sit-in acting like it's a party instead of protest was entirely relatable. You don't belong there if you aren't willing to act right.
My overall feelings on this book was that I was blown away. An excellent historical fiction story that put you IN the action. I truly believe this would be an amazing course book for American Literature classes in middle or high school. The conversations an educator could lead on this book are endless. The conversations started in Gibran's course were enough to get me thinking.
I highly recommend this book to everyone, all ages, all races, all creeds. I learned so much and I have grown for having read this.
Thank you, Ms. Allen, for this truly eye-opening experience.