I just love that, and I loved every moment of reading this book. They did what human beings looking for freedom, throughout history, have often done. What binds these stories together was the back-against-the-wall, reluctant yet hopeful search for something better, any place but where they were. They did what humans have done for centuries when life became untenable - what the pilgrims did under the tyranny of British rule, what the Scotch-Irish did in Oklahoma when the land turned to dust, what the Irish did when there was nothing to eat, what the European Jews did during the spread of Nazism, what the landless in Russia, Italy, China, and elsewhere did when something better across the ocean called to them. Their migration was a response to an economic and social structure not of their making. The actions of the people in this book were both universal and distinctly American.

How does one even go about telling the stories of more than six million people over a span of nearly 60 years?īut Wilkerson had me hooked within the first 15 pages of them book, in part because of paragraphs like this one at the end of her introduction: There are three main characters, but the story Wilkerson is trying to tell seems overwhelming to even think about.

Long Review: At first glance, The Warmth of Other Suns seems like an intimidating book. Opinions expressed in this review are my own, and don’t reflect the thoughts of the panel or reflect our ratings of the book. Why I Read It: This book was shortlisted for the Indie Lit Awards in nonfiction, and I am a judge for that panel. One Sentence Review: Wilkerson’s book manages to be both epic and deeply personal at the same time, and is the kind of nonfiction that changed the way I think about the world.

One Sentence Summary: Between 19 almost six million African American migrated from the South to escape Jim Crow laws, and this Great Migration changed the entire face of the United States. Title: The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration

The warmth of other suns review