WRITER.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars

128 pages

Graphic Novel, Memoir

This is both a coming-of-age story and a history of the Civil Rights Movement. It is a memoir of Congressman John Lewis, who was involved in nonviolent protests and attempts at desegregation. The book switches between Lewis telling his story in 2009 and his life starting back in the 1950s.

I appreciate how the graphic novel builds up the story of his childhood even before he became involved in civil rights work. I became very invested in his life. I especially liked his stories about chickens, since I used to take care of about a dozen of them myself. He used to talk to them and name them and tell them apart, just like me. He tells the story of how Big Belle, one of his chickens, got stuck in a well for five days until he managed to coax her into a bucket with bread crumbs. Even in 2009, he has decorative chickens as mementos of that time.

Where this book really shines though, is in its rich history and in his efforts to help earn civil rights for Black Americans. He spoke of how the protestors would practice nonviolent protest by taking turns with one yelling insults and being aggressive and the other staying calm and making eye contact. The protestors ran sit-ins, where they would sit at a counter and stay there presumably before they were served, which they never were until real change was instituted. It got to the point where there were hundreds of nonviolent protestors, and many were taken to jail. In 1960, Lewis suffered the first of many arrests.

He is old enough to remembers the time before separate but equal was overturned, when no one bothered paving roads to Black communities, they used separate bathrooms, and their playgrounds were vastly different. He even planned to desegregate Troy State – a white college – by being the only Black attending, but he decided against it because it would bring danger to his family.

I loved this book, and would recommend it for anyone interested in history and the rights movement in particular, but I could also see it as a good book to read in high schools.