A Long Time Coming
A Lyrical Biography of Race in America from Ona Judge to Barack Obama
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15
A Lyrical Biography of Race in America from Ona Judge to Barack Obama
Ratings1
Average rating4
This YA biography-in-verse of six important Black Americans from different eras, including Ona Judge, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Martin Luther King Jr., and Barack Obama, chronicles the diverse ways each fought racism and shows how much—and how little—has changed for Black Americans since our country’s founding. Full of daring escapes, deep emotion, and subtle lessons on how racism operates, A LONG TIME COMING reveals the universal importance of its subjects’ struggles for justice. From freedom seeker Ona Judge, who fled her enslavement by America’s first president, to Barack Obama, the first Black president, all of Shepard’s protagonists fight valiantly for justice for themselves and all Black Americans in any way that they can. But it is also a highly personal book, as Shepard — whose maternal grandfather was enslaved — shows how the grand sweep of history has touched his life, reflecting on how much progress has been made against racism, while also exhorting readers to complete the vast work that remains to be done.
Reviews with the most likes.
There is a lot to like about this book and I think it could work well in a classroom setting especially. I really appreciated the way it shows the timeline and how these 6 notable figures (Ona Judge, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Martin Luther King Jr, Barack Obama) overlapped with each other and built off of each other. I will say that in the MLK section I noticed that it presents the typical simplified version of the Rosa Parks story–that she simply was tired and wouldn't move from her seat, rather than the strategic decision planned in advance by her along with her NAACP chapter–made me a little skeptical. (To say nothing of [b:Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice 5201814 Claudette Colvin Twice Toward Justice Phillip Hoose https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1317793048l/5201814.SX50.jpg 5268969]). And I understand that it's short, biographies in verse of each figure and it wasn't necessarily a chapter about Rosa Parks but like...it could have just been a couple more sentences really. But as a whole text I think it works very well.
