kagoldeneagle's review against another edition
5.0
Incredible
This is one of the top books I’ve ever read on Mississippi history. It shines a light on special people and actions in my state’s history, while not shying away from the absolutely horrendous darkness.
This is one of the top books I’ve ever read on Mississippi history. It shines a light on special people and actions in my state’s history, while not shying away from the absolutely horrendous darkness.
caedocyon's review against another edition
4.0
Just a lot of stuff I didn't know or knew only vaguely. Well written; really liked it. The end, which details how they fail to achieve their specific demands but (you could argue) laid the groundwork for change anyway, has given me a lot of food for thought about how society actually goes about changing and the role of activism.
mburnsides's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Murder, Police brutality, Death, Hate crime, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Racial slurs, and Violence
aphonusbalonus's review against another edition
4.0
Oh, I adored this book. I enjoyed the writing so much that after I read the parts I needed to for my history report, I kept reading. (I am now very behind in finishing my history report). The voice used to explain these events was just the right amount of wonderful, and it confronted many of the tragedies faced over the year in a thoughtful way. But don't let that make you think this glossed over the horror of what happened, it was brutal and sometimes hard to read.
ash_hernick's review against another edition
4.0
A detailed account of the Mississippi Freedom Summer. Although I appreciated the way this book fleshed out the events of a frequently forgotten aspect of the American Civil Rights movement, the book feels like it leans too heavily on white perspectives of this event, instead of focusing on Southern African Americans who were directly impacted by the Freedom Summer.
socraticgadfly's review against another edition
5.0
This book brought the whole panoply of Mississippi 1964 alive ... class divisions within whites in Mississippi helping to fuel the racism; the beginnings of class difference within blacks, too; the languid torpor before mass availability of AC; the casualness of cruel violence, and much, much more.
It's a wonder that more and more of the volunteers didn't come down with something like full-blown PTSD; I have no doubt of Watson's findings that more of them stayed single than the national average or showed other psychological changes.
Yet, as he notes, Mississippi, while still having boatloads of black poverty (as well as a fair amount of poor white poverty), has made not just good strides on racial issues, but better strides, in many ways, than other parts of the country. (Not you, Haley Barbour of self-puffery; sit back down.)
hannah_badger's review against another edition
5.0
This is a chilling depiction of what happened during Freedom Summer, made even more chilling by the ways in which the racist rhetoric is being repeated almost word for word in 2020 America.
If I ever stop shaking uncontrollably maybe I can give a more thoughtful review of a really gripping and important book.
If I ever stop shaking uncontrollably maybe I can give a more thoughtful review of a really gripping and important book.
marystevens's review against another edition
5.0
a detailed, comprehensive and accurate look at freedom summer from every point of view: SNCC who invited us, the volunteers, the black community, white Mississippians, the FBI, Bobby Kennedy, LBJ, the celebrities who came down, the rest of the world, which watched, horrified.
kaycechampion's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
sad
slow-paced
4.25
librarianonparade's review against another edition
4.0
In the summer of 1964 hundreds of college students gave up their holiday to volunteer for the SNCC (Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee) in Mississippi, working to further race equality in what was at the time the poorest and most virulently racist state in the nation. They set up schools, teaching children and adults, worked to register African-Americans for the vote, garnered signatures for an alternative delegation to the Democratic National Convention, all in the face of astonishingly violent opposition.
Bombs, drive-by shootings, beatings were an everyday occurrence, and worse. On the very first day most of the students arrived, three men went missing - civil rights activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner - a famous case that later went on to be made into the film Mississippi Burning. Many of the students were young and idealistic about America, an idealism they would soon lose. Many couldn't believe they could still be within the United States, couldn't believe such poverty and oppression could exist in a nation they had always believed to be a beacon of freedom.
Reading this book was incredibly eye-opening. Coming from a nation that has never had such a visible race problem (ours is perhaps quieter but no less damaging and insidious) I could hardly believe some of the events in this book. 1964 wasn't all that long ago, comparatively, and yet this book seems like reading about another world. I could hardly put it down.
Bombs, drive-by shootings, beatings were an everyday occurrence, and worse. On the very first day most of the students arrived, three men went missing - civil rights activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner - a famous case that later went on to be made into the film Mississippi Burning. Many of the students were young and idealistic about America, an idealism they would soon lose. Many couldn't believe they could still be within the United States, couldn't believe such poverty and oppression could exist in a nation they had always believed to be a beacon of freedom.
Reading this book was incredibly eye-opening. Coming from a nation that has never had such a visible race problem (ours is perhaps quieter but no less damaging and insidious) I could hardly believe some of the events in this book. 1964 wasn't all that long ago, comparatively, and yet this book seems like reading about another world. I could hardly put it down.