A Long Time Coming: A Lyrical Biography of Race in America from Ona Judge to Barack Obama

A Long Time Coming

A Lyrical Biography of Race in America from Ona Judge to Barack Obama

2023 • 338 pages

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Average rating4

15

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.

February 1, 2024Report this review