These are the kind of details you remember when your life is about to change. The second copy was softer, and had a dented corner, but was also in pretty good shape. Glossy and flat, possibly never read before. And yet, being a seventh grader, I generally wanted nothing to do with her. I had lucked out with an incredibly awesome, loving mom. Worse, I was plagued with guilt for not looking forward to this project. I was not looking forward to this project. My mom, who was largely responsible for me being an avid reader, would be reading along with me. The assignment was to read a book along with a parent and discuss it. All the books on the rack came in pairs, which meant fewer selections overall. But I had to choose a new one, and worse than that, I had to pick up two copies of it. It listed to one side, so I made sure to stand on the side it was leaning away from, in order to see the books better. Two award-winning sequels, Let the Circle Be Unbroken and The Road to Memphis, and a long-awaited prequel, The Land, continue the profoundly moving tale of the Logan family.It was one of those rickety paperback book racks that creak when you turn it. Taylor's vivid portrayal of ugly racism and the poignancy of Cassie's bewilderment and gradual toughening against social injustice and the men and women who perpetuate it, will remain with readers forever. Twenty-five years after it was first published, this special anniversary edition of the classic strikes as deep and powerful a note as ever. You may not understand that now but one day you will. You ain't never had to live on nobody's place but your own and long as I live and the family survives, you'll never have to.

But during the course of one devastating year when her community begins to be ripped apart by angry night riders threatening African Americans, she and her three brothers come to understand why the land they own means so much to their Papa. Nine-year-old Cassie Logan, growing up protected by her loving family, has never had reason to suspect that any white person could consider her inferior or wish her harm. Taylor's unforgettable novels she recounts 'not only the joy of growing up in a large and supportive family, but my own feelings of being faced with segregation and bigotry.' Her Newbery Medal-winning Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry tells the story of one African American family, fighting to stay together and strong in the face of brutal racist attacks, illness, poverty, and betrayal in the Deep South of the 1930s.

Roll of thunder hear my cry book series