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Overview
In the summer of 1955, fourteen-year-old Clement enters a general store in Money, Mississippi to purchase a soda. Unaware of the consequences of flouting the rules governing black-white relations in the South, this Chicago native defies tradition, by laying a dime on the counter and turns to depart. Miss Cuthbert, the store attendant, demands that he place the money in her hand, but he refuses, declaring, "I ain't no slave!" and exits with a sense of entitlement unknown to black people at the time. His behavior results in his brutal murder. This event sparks a war in Money, forcing the black community to galvanize its strength in pursuit of equality.
Synopsis
In the summer of 1955, fourteen-year-old Clement enters a general store in Money, Mississippi, to purchase a soda. Unaware of the consequences of flouting the rules governing black-white relations in the South, the Chicago native defies tradition by laying a dime on the counter and turns to depart. Miss Cuthbert, the store attendant, demands that he place the money in her hand, but he refuses, declaring "I ain't no slave!" and exits with a sense of entitlement unknown to black people at the time. His behavior results in his brutal murder. This event sparks a war in Money, forcing the black community to galvanize its strength in pursuit of equality.
Publishers Weekly
While spending the summer of 1955 with relatives in Money, Miss., 14-year-old Chicago-raised Clement unleashes hell when he buys a root beer at the general store and refuses to place the nickel in the white female cashier's hand, leaving it instead on the counter. Though his sharecropping grandparents and aunt and uncle try desperately to protect him-his grandfather shoots and kills the men who come looking for the boy-Clement is abducted and his death is inevitable. Patriarch Jeremiah Johnson's pain and anger bring him to call a town meeting, and the town's blacks decide to stand up against generations of murders, lynchings, rapes and other violence. Unfortunately, Black (They Tell Me of a Home) stocks his novel with stereotypes-from the downtrodden blacks to the dumb, bigoted rednecks-who speak in phonetically rendered dialogue ("What we gon do?"). The clumsy, heavy dose of Christianity and rudimentary portrayal of racism will also limit appeal. (Feb.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Editorials
From the Publisher
Praise for THE SACRED PLACE:“The Sacred Place is a captivating art of storytelling in a time before the Civil Rights Era. This great novel serves as a time machine, helping us revisit our past in hopes of someday reconciling our differences.”—Keith A. Beauchamp, Director/Producer, “The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till”
“The Sacred Place is a work of power and depth, reminding us of a recent, painful past that too many of us have tried to forget.”—Trey Ellis, author of Platitudes
“The writing is splendidly mature. It ranks among our best new story-telling. In these pages we can rediscover how to be patient with the Universe and its seeming axiom: Freedom costs!”—Jeffery Lynn Woodyard, Ph.D., Independent Scholar and Researcher
“Readers will wonder, applaud, laugh, cry, and share in those intersections where living history makes lived history not only tolerable, but impressively acceptable.”—Trudier Harris, author of Summer Snow: Reflections from a Black Daughter of the South
“The Sacred Place is a magnificent illustration of the power of his imagination in which the virtues of courage, sacrifice, and, most importantly, spiritual maturity jump off every page.” -Dr. Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., author, Exodus! Religion, Race, and Nation in Early Nineteenth-Century Black America