Vanguard

Starred review from October 1, 2020

Beginning with her own history as a descendant of enslaved people, Jones (history, Johns Hopkins Univ.; Birthright Citizens) shares stories of women in her family who created paths to political power as freedom did not lead to liberty or dignity. This standout social history shows how the 19th Amendment did not guarantee Black women the right to vote--state laws, including literary tests, poll taxes, and restrictions on descendants of enslaved people, were implemented to suppress turnout. Jones masterfully outlines how Black women used the pen, pulpit, and podium to share information in the 19th and 20th centuries, and how teaching each other how to read and write was the greatest form of resistance. Moving chapters follow journalist Mary Ann Shadd Cary, poet and orator Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, educators Charlotte Forten Grimk� and Mary Church Terrell, and writers Harriet Jacobs and Anna Julia Cooper, among others, as they sought to link voting rights to civil rights. Notably, Jones recounts how these women, and others, such as Fannie Lou Hamer, faced danger for their visibility while often being ignored by white suffragists. VERDICT A necessary, insightful book that shines light on Black women underexplored in history. Jones writes narrative nonfiction at its best.--Stephanie Sendaula, Library Journal

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Mela Lee's steadily flowing narration includes the expected variations in pitch, tone, and pace for quotations and documentation throughout this long sweep of history on Black rights from the mid-1700s through the present. Topics range from Voting Rights Amendments 15 and 19 to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and on to current events. Lee adopts a slow, stately pace that allows listeners to absorb the lengthy and sometimes disturbing events in the fight for political equity. A host of key figures includes Phyllis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, and Susan B. Anthony, Mary Bethune, Maria Stewart, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Rosa Parks. Lee's unfailing performance ensures that listeners can focus on the topic and its crucial details. M.B.K. � AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine