What is your favorite social justice book (fiction or non)?
What is your favorite social justice book (fiction or non)?
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What is your favorite social justice book (fiction or non)?
Every essay in “The Fire This Time” (curated by Jesmyn Ward) is stunning. A tremendous expansion on James Baldwin’s original work: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28505023-the-fire-this-time?from_search=true
Yes! Loved this one!
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson is a good one
Just finished that one last night, it was excellent.
The only book that has ever made me cry. I was full-on sobbing. ?
Absolutely devastating. Made me cry for our country.
For fans of Just Mercy, read The Sun Does Shine. It is written by one of the guys Stevenson rescued from Death Row after 27 years. Both books blew me away.
Just Mercy or Evicted
I taught part of Evicted in my 10th grade class. Blew my mind.
Both are excellent.
Having worked in housing for an organization serving those who experienced homelessness, Evicted was intriguing.
Evicted was excellent.
It took me way too long to read Evicted bc it was so stressful to read. I think it is a must read book though. It’s expensive to be poor. 🙁
Evicted was fantastic. I lived in Milwaukee for 10 years, so I could picture the neighborhoods he talked about the whole time I read it.
Also The Warmth of Other Suns. Sheds a light on sharecropping, segregation, and Jim Crow as people try to move to make better lives for themselves: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8171378-the-warmth-of-other-suns?from_search=true
Wonderful book. Also Devil in the Grove, about Thurgood Marshall’s early career.
P.S. enjoyed watching you on Jeopardy!?
Unequal Childhoods by Annette Lareau is my favorite! So informative and interesting! There is also a follow up on the publisher’s website on how those kids turned out as adults.
So You Want To Talk About Race is fantastic. I also recently read When They Call You a Terrorist and loved it.
Read them both and agree!
Justice.. what is the right thing to do.. Michael sandel
Pro: Reclaiming Abortion Rights by Katha Pollitt
If you liked that you should check out “Life’s Work: A Moral Argument for Choice” by Willie Parker. It’s a perspective we don’t really get to hear in the US. Very refreshing!
Killers of the Flower Moon
Evicted is an excellent read!!!
A classic: The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Dead Man Walking
I love that one, too.
The same
Just Mercy– Bryan Stevenson
Evicted by Matthew Desmond was amazing. I also thought Stamped from the Beginning was brilliant.
Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/200883
MOTHERHOOD IN BONDAGE: FORWARDED BY MARGARET MARSH by Margaret Sanger
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1008701
Just finished the sun does shine and it was such a well written story
The hate u give
When They Call You a Terrorist
I read Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin when I was 13. Living in an all white community during the Civil Rights movement, a teacher recommended this book for an insight into movement.
Same here. I read it in the mid 60s. It was pretty popular and for the first time I understood what living black in the south was like. I’ve never forgotten it.
Reading this as a teenager changed my life forever
I read it as a teen too. It was an education for whites. Excellent.
Exactly!
I liked, Black Like Me, by John Howard Griffin.
Five Smooth Stones by Ann Fairbairn
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/271685
Wonderful book!
The Hate You Give
White Rage
Symptoms of Being Human
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda
I am Malala
An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20588662
Evicted
The new jim crow.
Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America by Gilbert King
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13374868
The Grapes of Wrath
I am Malala.
The Warmth of Other Suns
1491
Lies Your History Teacher Told You
An Indigenous People’s History of the United States
An Inconvenient Indian
This Book is Gay
The Drowning of Stephan Jones
Lies and An Indigenous People’s are both excellent. I only just recently downloaded 1491 but am looking forward to it. I actually had my boys read Lies My Teacher Told Me as part of their required hs reading.
Farenheit 451
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich
A Civil Action
The God Delusion
To Kill a Mockingbird
God is Not Great
Unstoppable
Half the Sky
The Other Wes Moore
Nonfiction- Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson. Fiction – The Hate U Give and Small Great Things
Small Great Things stays with me…so powerful! ❤️
Finished Small Great Things a few days ago. Very thought provoking , powerful book.
Just mercy
Shame of the Nation by Jonathan Kozol
We Should all be Feminists
I agree with many of the above.
Not quite Justice but two additions to the list: Howard Zinns A Peoples History of the US and for fiction I think Pamela Sargent’s The Shore of Women is a wonderful fiction story about men vs women in our society.
To Kill A Mockingbird
All of Corban Addison’s books are fantastic. I also loved I Am Malala.
>I Am Malala
I forgot about that one.
The Jungle by Uptain Sinclair
Wore a term paper on The Jungle in Junior year history. The book changed my life view
Just Mercy
Between the world and me. Ta-nehesi Coates
Wonderful book!
Next on my nonfiction to-read list. Can’t wait to read it!
The New Jim Crow was paradigm shifting for me and challenged everything I had been taught growing up.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6792458-the-new-jim-crow?from_search=true
Only it is happening here – right now, today.
I recently bought this to read.
Christian Nation
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich
What is the What by Dave Eggers
That was a good book
Four Spirits by Sena Jeter Naslund is awesome.
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20342617-just-mercy
He did a livestream for our university when we did this book for a freshman read. I thought his speech was more organized than the book and more of a call to action. I think you can find a few of his speeches on YouTube.
Roots, though fictional, had quite a bit of historical research. I got a lot out of it.
I would also say Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature is a book that transformed how I look at the world.
Edit: The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is another great one, jumpstarting the worker’s rights movement.
To Kill a Mockingbird
Nickle and Dimed by Barbara Erenreich
Protect and Defend by Richard North Patterson
Brother, I’m Dying by Edwidge Danticat
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
The Devil’s Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea
Drift by Rachel Maddow
Girls Like Us by Rachel Lloyd
Enrique’s Journey by Sonia Nazario
Whipping Girl by Julia Serano
for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf by Ntozake Shange
Devil in the Grove by Gilbert King
‘Missile Envy’ by Dr. Helen Caldicott
Just started Gilbert King: Beneath a Ruthless Sky. Read The Devil in the Grove and found it fascinating and sad.
A Lesson Before Dying
Slavery by Another Name
Pedagogy of Hope by Paulo Freire
Evicted by Matthew Desmond
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Native Son
Uncle Tom’s Cabin
A Civil Action by Jonathan Harr
Dear Bully: 70 Authors Tell Their Story.
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson and on the fiction side pretty much anything by Steinbeck.
To Kill a Mockingbird
Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol
https://www.amazon.com/Tyranny-Twenty-Lessons-Twentieth-Century/dp/0804190119/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1526842329&sr=8-1&keywords=on+tyranny
https://www.amazon.com/Hillbilly-Elegy-Memoir-Family-Culture/dp/0062300547/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1526842869&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=hillbilly+elegy&psc=1
Toss up: Native Son by Richard Wright or Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle.
“The Jungle.”
The pecan Man
Evicted
lord of the flies & to kill a mockingbird
All books by Toni Morrison; To Kill A Mockingbird; The Diary of Anne Frank; Night by Elie Wiesel; A Lesson Before Dying by Earnest Gaines; Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton; The Hiding Place by Cory ten Boom; I could go on…
Barbara, you certainly have read some marvelous books!
The Help
It’s true
Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult A white baby dies while under the care of a black nurse – based on a true story
Does The Help qualify?
Prison Writings by Leonard Peltier.
‘A Time to Kill” by John Grisham
Coming to Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody
Night by Elie Wiesel is also fabulous.
Just Mercy
Vonnegut
The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay
The Hate U Give and To Kill a Mockingbird
The Glass Castle
“It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis
“A Civil Action” by Jonathan Harr
That was such a compelling and important story.
The Fire Next Time by James @Baldwin
Savage Inequalities, Jonathan Kozol
The Grapes of Wrath.
Love that book!
The American Way of Poverty: How the Other Half Still Lives by S. Abramsky 2013… Ward, J. (2016). The Fire this Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race…Isenberg, N. (2016). White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America.
To Kill A Mockingbird
Just Mercy, nonfiction
Just Mercy
The Fire This Time(Jesmyn Ward)
I’ve read two good ones this year, Hillbilly Elegy and Radium Girls.
The Girls Who Went Away.
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingslover.
I thought of this one, was not sure if it qualified as social justice. I thought it does.
Whatever Happened to Willie Earle? by Will Willimon
A couple of classics: “The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists” by Robert Tressell (fiction) and “Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist” by Alexander Berkman (nonfiction)
Both of these can be found online at Project Gutenberg and “The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists” has an excellently narrated recording by Tadhg Hynes at LibriVox.
How the Other Half Lives by Jacob A Riis
Fiction To Kill a Mockingbird; nonfiction White Trash: the 400 Year History of Class in America
The Hate You Give
Yes to Just Mercy. Also, I Can’t Breathe by Matt Taibbi and The Sun Does Shine by Ray Hinton and Reading with Patrick by Michelle Kuo. Fiction includes The Mercy Seat, This Is How It Begins by Joan Dempsey
and of course To Kill a Mockingbird
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-mercy-seat-by-elizabeth-h-winthrop.html
I read READING WITH PATRICK when it first came out last year. I cannot say enough good things about it. Have recommended it to many. Now out in paperback!
I listened to an audiobook of “The Hate U Give” and was incredibly moved. Same with “Just Mercy” by the wonderful Bryan Stevenson, a prophet for our times.
Still hungry in America by Robert Coles
Amazing Grace by Jonathan Kozol. Essentially anything by Kozol or Paul Farmer.
Imbeciles: Eugenics and theThe Sterilization of Carrie Buck, The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks
Warriors Don’t Cry
The Absolutely True Diary Of a Part Time Indian – F
You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me – N
Both – Sherman Alexie
To kill a mockingbird. A time to kill. The Green Mile.
A People’s History of the U.S. – Howard Zinn
The Warmth of other Suns – Isabel Wilkerson
White Trash
Just picked this up. ☺
Great book…also you might try Slavery by Another Name…eye opener
Evicted by Matthew Desmond.
Evicted by Matthew Desmond.
The Other Wes Moore, Tortilla Curtain
John Grisham
addresses justice issues in a popular format.Walter Mosely’s Easy Rawlins series is also a favorite. Recent books Eviction & Killers of the Flower Moon were both astonishing and eye-opening.
The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.
Anything by Ernest Gaines!!!!
The Hate U Give is pretty great. Older – To Kill a Mockingbird.
Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town by Jon Krakauer and Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich (sp?)
just mercy
5 Smooth Stones. I’ll have to look up author to spell her name correctly
It’s by Ann Fairbairn – one of my favorites.
@Regina , thanks. You are the only one to respond when I’ve mentioned the book.
I think it’s a forgotten classic but it very much deserves to be remembered.
I found this title on my library Hoopla site. Thanks @Jeneane… I just added this book to my TBR pile. 🙂
Five Smooth Stones was the first book I read, as an adult, that made me start to ask questions.
I read this book in 1973, located it in one of our pubic libraries and currently rereading. Powerful read – definitely needs to be remembered. @Jeneane
I read the book many years ago and it definitely should be included.
Small great things
Fire in Beulah by Rilla Askew
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Cider House Rules by John Irving.
Between the World an Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Just Mercy by BRYAN Stevenson.
Devil in the White City. Also The Alienist
Down and Out in London and Paris by George Orwell. In it, in a chapter describing the experience of being forced, along with many others and under threat of physical violence, into a London flophouse and having to pay a few pence for the privilege, Orwell, in one sentence, notes that profit is the root cause of poverty as the flophouse is more profitable than London’s fanciest hotel “…there is more money to be made taking pennies from the poor than pounds from the rich.”.
Barking at the Choir by Greg Boyle!
Thank u missed that Father Boyle had a new book.
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson. Must read!
@Sandra I didn’t! I’m so glad he was on there!
The New Jim Crow
An excellent book
For a work of fiction, I’d say To Kill a Mockingbird. For non-fiction, I’d pick Martin Luther King Jr’s Why We Can’t Wait.
TKAM
I Am a Man by Joe Starita
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Nobody Knows My Name. James Baldwin
Native Son by Richard Wright really captures the terror of being an illiterate marginalized person.
Evicted.
Dead Man Walking and To Kill a Mockingbird
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson. “Fear and anger are a threat to justice; they can inflict a community, a state, or a nation and make us blind, irrational, and dangerous.” And Sherman Alexi’s memoir: You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me. I laughed and cried at the same time and when I finished it I started at the beginning and read it again.
Can you tell me more about Just Mercy
Here is a description of the author and the book: Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a legal practice dedicated to defending those most desperate and in need: the poor, the wrongly condemned, and women and children trapped in the farthest reaches of our criminal justice system. One of his first cases was that of Walter McMillian, a young man who was sentenced to die for a notorious murder he insisted he didn’t commit. The case drew Bryan into a tangle of conspiracy, political machination, and legal brinksmanship—and transformed his understanding of mercy and justice forever. Most of the cases Stevenson investigated were of black men unjustly prosecuted and and sentenced – many to death. He tells the story of a corrupt legal system that fuels anger and fear.
Both books excellent.
The Round House by Louise Erdrich. She is a wonderful Native American author.
Yes she is
She’s one of my favorites, and that was a great book.
One of my favorite authors
There are so many wonderful and life altering books mentioned here. I will also add Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (Dee Brown) , Stolen Continents by Richard Wright and For Those I Loved by Martin Grey. They are all non-fiction.
Make that Ronald Wright! Richard wrote Black Boy and Native Son, wonderful books.
Another great book is North of Crazy by Neltje. It is her autobiography and before the “Me, Too” movement it empowered women to speak out about their own experiences of sexual abuse. Also, She is a remarkable woman.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
That is one book I will never forget.
Amen to that one
Clinton Cash by Peter Schweizer
Fiction: The Hate U Give, non-fiction: The New Jim Crow
Completely agree with both of these! Also Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson.
The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls and Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance
Just finished Hillbilly Elegy and am passing it on to my daughter and grandson.
The Last Ballad by Wiley Cash. It’s about the attempt to unionize cotton mill workers for better wages.
Thank u!
This book is sitting on my bedside table, waiting on me!
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison was also very mind-opening
Morrison is my favorite living writer but The Bluest Eye has always been too painful for me.
It is indeed a sad book which reflects a very sad reality..and therefore very impactful.
And mind blowing.
@Megan
Evicited and Nickled and Dimed: Living on minimum wage. Both good books.
Does The Outsiders count?
A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn
The Pelican Brief
Jodi Picout Great Small Things
So many great suggestions; I’ll add Trail of Tears by Gloria Jahoda to the growing list.
I just read ‘The Sun Does SHine” by Ray Hinton. It was realy good 🙂
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
Yes. Incredible book.
All American Boys by Jason Reynolds.
This book had kids who never read asking for more time to read aloud as a group.
@Michele what age?
High school students. Possibly 8th grade. Language in the book. Just an all around great book to look at perspective taking. I had my kids write “ get well cards” to the main character in the hospitall. What they had to say was amazing. Empathy was present.
To Kill a Mockingbird
“Killers of the Flower Moon” by David Grann.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
“To Kill a Mockingbird”
To Kill a Mockingbird
A Walk in the Sun by Corbin Addison, it’s a novel that sheds light on human trafficking
Animal Farm
Recently, Hillbilly Elegy.
I thought I would but I didn’t care for this one that much.
@Denise I agree. The book was poorly researched and poorly referenced.
Read this recently. Explained a lot to me re why the last prez election went the way it did re certain segments of our country. Am glad I read it. We need to understand the devastation that the loss of our factory/blue collar jobs has caused and how it affects lives. Not sure there are real remedies addressed, but it paints a clear enough picture, in my opinion, of history & results via the author’s life & experience.
My book group is scheduled to read and review this book later this year.
Battle Cry of Freedom (both volumes) and Slavery by Another Name are 2 of my favs. I generally lean toward this genre and non-fiction, to help give me an understanding of the shape of the world around me/us. I would say that A Warmth of Other Suns may be one of my all-time favorite books, period. It’s so much more than any of these genres to me… that book was everything!
Edited to add: Dr King’s last book, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community was powerful and now seems to embody prophetic insights. I wish more folks would read it. I didn’t have anyone you discuss it with when I finished it.
Excellent books!
Beloved
Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck
I’m currently reading So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo. So far, it’s excellent.
Trinity by Leon Uris
I read it in the 70s and wanted to join the IRA!
Through the Eyes of the Judged: Autobiographical Sketches by Incarcerated Young Men (edited by Stephanie Guilloud.) I used this in the classroom.
Animal Farm and To Kill A Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird
Half the Sky.
Excellent choice
Thanks to everyone who suggested Just Mercy.
Great book. Great man. Awesome historian. A national treasure.
ditto!
Added to my TBR!
@Kathy Amazing man
What courage & commitment to take on our broken, racist system.
I’m in the middle of Just Mercy right now. SO amazing, a call to all of us to be more compassionate.
@Bethany With so much in Mercy and in the news, it seems to me there is one standard of punishment for white people and another far more punitive for brown & black people. I used to believe the disparity was a function of poverty and race. Now i think race trumps almost everything. I do recommend The New Jim Crow.
I agree with you completely! I do still think that there is a tier of people who are discriminated against because of poverty, but racism is the much bigger issue. Jury selection is still a huge issue! I was also convicted by how influenced I am by how the media reports these stories. I like to think that I am a fair person, but I want to be better at pursuing the full story before making judgments.
@Bethany Yes I agree about the tier system and poverty.
Waking Up White
Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Erenricht
Between The World and Me, Witness to the Revolution: Radicals, Resisters, Vets, Hippies, and the Year America Lost Its Mind and Found Its Soul by Clara Bingham, My Life on the Road
by Gloria Steinem, I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban, Tim Wise books.
Wow! What a list! I will have to put some of these on my reading queue.
There Are No Children Here, by Alex Kotlowitz, nonfiction. Fiction, “Hard Times” by Charles Dickens.
David Copperfield, To Kill a Mockingbird
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, non fiction. To Kill a Mockingbird, fiction.
Soul on Ice, Soledad Brother, Assata, Letter From A Birmingham Jail, The Isis Papers, The New Jim Crow.
Looking Away: Inequality, Prejudice and Indifference in New India was an amazing book. Super impactful. Changed how I think about poverty and interacting with poor people.
Grapes of Wrath
A very important book that will make readers demand change.
The Grapes of Wrath!!!!
I just read that for the first time
@Karyn –did you like it? It was a very emotionally moving book for me and I have read it multiple times
I thought it was fantastic! I’ve only read The Pearl and of mice and men, but I really enjoy Steinbeck.
@Karyn Yes, he is one of my favorite American authors.
To Kill as Mockingbird, Harper Lee. War and Peace, Tolstoy
The Help, Katherine Stockett
Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai and young fiction, One Crazy Summer, Rita Williams-Garcia
Inside Out and Back Again was so worthwhile, and I could read it over and over!
Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin.
The Sun Does Shine – Anthony Ray Hinton. Mind changer about the death penalty!
BLACK LIKE ME was the book I immediately thought of when I saw this question. I read it close to when it first came out in the ‘60s (as a young teen) and it affected me deeply. More recently, the historical novel THE INVENTION OF WINGS by Sue Monk Kidd will always be a favorite – abolition, Quakers, & women’s rights before many in this country even thought
women were capable of much beyond housework & childcare.
To Kill A Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird, The Help
My choice, too!
Warriors Don’t Cry
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson.
My son will be attending Middle Tennessee State University this fall. Just Mercy is this year’s campus wide summer read.
Just Mercy. Bryan Stevenson
The Warmth of Other Suns
@Anne Great book!
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Yes!
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
To Kill a Mockingbird
Wow, I went through the whole list. Amazing. Many I’ve read, several I want to read. I would also suggest Terry Tempest Williams’ books, REFUGE: AN UNNATURAL HISTORY OF FAMILY AND PLACE and WHEN WOMEN WERE BIRDS: FIFTY-FOUR VARIATIONS ON VOICE. The latter book listed is beautifully poetic – it blew me away. First book mentioned here intertwines a family history of cancer (especially in women) and the nuclear testing in Utah area (effects on the population).
The Grapes of Wrath, A Raisin in the Sun, and Black Like Me
The Fire Next Time. James Baldwin
James Baldwin is always a good choice. I hope you had a chance to see Raoul Peck’s I am not your negro.
It’s on the list!
@Rebecca It was one of my favorite films last year.
The Bible (I could list individual books but I am sure that anyone esle who has read the Bible understands)
A Child called “It”
Lord of the Flies
The New Jim Crow
The Hunger Games
The Lottery (that will be the last one I name, lol)
I recently read A Long Walk to Water. Not so much a book on social justice but much much more -about giving back. A great book for young readers. My 12 year old granddaughter is reading it now.
Wow! I know some of mine might have been reaching? I am looking into A Long Walk to Water, thanks! This sounds great! A Long Walk to Water begins as two stories, told in alternating sections, about a girl in Sudan in 2008 and a boy in Sudan in 1985. The girl, Nya, is fetching water from a pond that is two hours’ walk from her home: she makes two trips to the pond every day. The boy, Salva, becomes one of the “lost boys” of Sudan, refugees who cover the African continent on foot as they search for their families and for a safe place to stay. Enduring every hardship from loneliness to attack by armed rebels to contact with killer lions and crocodiles, Salva is a survivor, and his story goes on to intersect with Nya’s in an astonishing and moving way.
My grandson shared that book with me after he read it as a fifth grader and I really loved it. Then he shared Malala’s autobiography. It’s great when a youngster shares their favorites!
I read LONG WALK TO WATER a year or two ago for a book discussion group I co-lead for retired Daughters of Charity. Excellent book, awesome discussion. One of the Sisters had actually met and spoken with the author some years back.
It was a 2017 Global Read Aloud pick. Great read. Several of our classes enjoyed this book.
To Kill a Mockingbird.
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Evicted by Matthew Desmond
Are you talking about fiction? Or non-fiction? Most social justice or social change, are non fiction. But most of this post looks like is fiction. Love to see non fiction books.
Susan Curtis, the poster stated fiction or non. Sometimes fiction can be as influential as non-fiction, for example: To Kill A Mockingbird, The Help, or 1984. As I read through the comments, the majority of books are non-fiction.
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson.
To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a mockingbird.
Grapes of Wrath, TKM
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Hate U Give
I recently read The Hate U Give. It’s so relevant to today’s society. It was so intense. I definitely think it’s something that makes you stop and think about life.
Johnny got his gun by Dalton Trumbo. Definitely made me anti-war and useless Loss of life.
I totally agree, read in high school and it made a big impact on me.
To Kill A Mockingbird and The Help.
Grapes of Wrath
Nothing to Envy
To Kill a Mockingbird, Black Like Me
Ditto
From Selma to Sorrow, a biography of martyred civil rights worker Viola Liuzzo.
She is my hero.
@Sandra I’ll never forget her.
@Bobbi You sound as if you knew her?
@Sandra No, but I was 11 when she was murdered. The Birmingham church bombing that killed four choirgirls happened on my tenth birthday. These people’s tragedies changed my life.
Bobbi Baker I am older but was too young to go South for Freedom Summer. These martyrs are my heros. They taught us to stand for real equality and against hate. So yes they changed my life as well. We Are Not Afraid by Seth Cagin is a book about Chaney, Schwerner, & Goodman that I admire.
Animal Farm?
To Kill A Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird
It Can’t Happen Here.
I love this question because it nade me think back to two great books that made an impact on me many years ago , and I believe they helped to shape how I view the world today: Kingsblood Royal by Sinclair Lewis and The Man by Irving Wallace.
to kill a mockingbird
The Help
The Pecan Man
this is a wonderful debut book that should have gotten more attention…if you are interested in the South and social justice this a book for you!
Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup
To Kill a Mockingbird.
The End of Poverty
Grapes of Wrath
Can anyone explain “social Justice” to me, please.
Social justice means all human beings in a society are treated justly and equally both under the law and in reality. Social justice books generally treat the struggles of a minority group or individual affected by inequality in their society.
In The Grapes of Wrath, for example, poor farmers are forced to give up their farms during the Depression, when the Dust Bowl makes farming impossible, and head for the fields of California to find work. They are treated as pariah by the police, the farm owners and the farm workers who are already there. TGW illustrates the unequal treatment of desperate poor people by Californians and earlier migrants–society–and the police–the law.
Similarly, To Kill a Mockingbird demonstrates the injustice of both white society in Meridian Mississippi, and the courts. A black man is accused of raping a poor white woman because her father catches her trying to get him to kiss her. He is arrested and jailed. A white mob attempts to seize him in order to lynch him, (society) but thanks to the activity of a principled white lawyer, this barbaric act is thwarted. However, the court case, at which he is found guilty despite clear evidence that he did not commit the crime, demonstrates that he is treated unequally under the law.
Hope this helps.
I would say that that means that the main character , after much suffering at the hands of greedy and terrible people , survives and thrives. Like “Cinderella . ” Like a fairy tale .
lots of book titles but how does the social come in and justice to me always means the courts (worked in corrections for 25 years
Social justice books address issues of justice & inequality but the endings vary from successful struggles to ongoing situations like housing (Eviction) or the justice systrm(The New Jim Crow)
Evicted was good. Would love to meet the author
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by Mark Herman
Have read it three times, and I am deeply moved every time.
@Joan me too!
Does Little Bee fit?
I think it does.
I just finished Somewhere There is Still a Sun by Michael Gruenbaum and Todd Hasak-Lowry It was written about experiencing Prague, Czechoslovakia and Terezín Concentration Camp from 1939-1945.
This one sounds really interesting. Will check it out.
@Marilyn It was very interesting.It written in first person as Mr Gruenbaum was a child. He was incredulous that people, SS Guards, could be so brutal. I have been too. I think it’s difficult for Americans to understand that kind of hate. We’ve never experienced it. But he hadn’t either.
Except I am from the South and we had the Civil Rights Movement. So I guess we always have to be aware of hate and bullying. Sad!
You might find A LUCKY CHILD: A MEMOIR OF SURVIVING AUSCHWITZ AS A YOUNG BOY by Thomas Buergenthal (with a forward by Elie Wiesel) really interesting. I was fascinated by his story, even as I was appalled at what he had to go through as a child during the war and then searching for his parents. Heartbreaking and yet inspiring re what he has done with his life. He’s served on national & international human rights commissions, been a noted professor of comparative law & jurisprudence at George Washington University, and been recipient of the US Holocaust Museum’s 2015 Ellie Wiesel Award. The book is well-written, with an addendum added to a recent re-printing that covers discovery re what happened to some family only after initial publication – it took that long before those holocaust records were finally released to family members. I have a friend who only just found out that some of her mother’s family perished in concentration camps or went missing back then, and she is trying to take all that in. I know I cannot begin to truly understand how this feels, but this book made me more aware of how easily it CAN happen here… or anywhere… if people don’t stand up for human rights. https://www.amazon.com/Lucky-Child-Memoir-Surviving-Auschwitz/dp/0316339180
JUST MERCY – Bryan Stevenson.
Just Mercy
To Kill a Mockingbird, Monster, Bless Me, Ultima, and Night. Also Cry the Beloved Country.
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Animal Farm is a terrific social justice allegory.
Grapes of Wrath
“What Is the What” by Dave Eggers was really eye opening.
“When Legends Die” really moved me when I was assigned it as a freshman in high school.
The Color Purple
Grapes of Wrath
Grapes of Wrath
The Lilac Girls
Evicted
Small Great Things
TKAM
Grapes of Wrath
How could I forget this!!
To Kill a Mockingbird and the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.
Just Mercy.
reading it now!
I might have to agree with Just Mercy. A powerful book!
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Such a great book. Brought me to tears for parents and child.
Lila by Marilynne Robinson
The Boy in The Striped Pajamas. There is no way to read this book and not feel what is happening. Animal Farm, Wicked, To Kill A Mockingbird , Before We Were Yours.
Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder. It’s non-fiction about the terrible health conditions in Haiti and one doctor’s efforts to fix it. Excellent.
We read it in a Book Club and really enjoyed it.
Re: Boy in the Striped Pajamas. I saw the movie. Cannot recall another with such a gut-wrenching ending.
Books by Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
The Cider House Rules.
I really liked Grisham’s The Client.
I liked Grissom ‘s The Rainmaker.
@Sherwon me too but I read/watched it more as a romance
@Bonnie, I like his first book. I think the name is A time to Kill.
@Elba I thought that was probably his best one!
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Excellent book.
And I usually prefer novels!
amazing read – I even had my HS biology class read some excerpts as part of a larger project!
I was mesmerized when I read it. I don’t now why I got the book, but once I started reading it, I simply couldn’t stop.
@Elba Me too. I bought it thinking “How will I ever get through it?” “Mesmerized” is an accurate word for it.
@Marilyn , my daughter is an In-vitro baby. And one day, one of her teacher said “Ana, you are a scientific experiment” and we both thought that it was hilarious. I met my daughter since she was a group of cells. It was the beginning of a beautiful journey. I think that the book was so great for me. Every cell that they used was practically her.
The Color Purple is still a favorite of mine. Learn new ideas every time I read it. Their Eyes Are Watching God is so lyrical I had to read it twice to understand it. First time I just enjoyed the language.
The Patternist series by Octavia Butler, also Kindred by Bulter as science fiction with social justice theme, excellent, non-fiction Mountains Beyond Mountains -Tracy Kidder, Between the World and Me – Ta- Nehisi Coates, Nickel and Dimed – Barbara Ehrenreich. I have many more but I really enjoyed these immensely.
I had KINDRED in my hands at Barnes & Noble, along with several others to check out while sipping my Chai latte in B&N cafe – which is usually how I decide how many of those books I can afford to actual buy on any day I wander into that store. It came down to KINDRED or a new printing of BRAVE NEW WORLD that also includes Huxley’s mon-fiction sequel published in 1958. The latter book won out. Have never read any of Butler’s books but hope to someday. Also, I have read MOUNTAINS BEYOND MOUNTAINS for a book discussion group I co-led for a couple of years, and loved it – an amazing story!
@Marilyn Brave New World is wonderful – but hands down Butler was a master sci fi writer with strong social justice themes. When you get a chance, start reading her work – I think you will enjoy it!
Kindred is by far my favorite of her books and just a favorite in general. It is one I recommend to everyone. Her Parable series is also good and eerily predictive of some current happenings.
@Cyndi agreed and I loved the Parable series as well – but I am biased, I have read everything she wrote and loved all of her work.
@LorriLee she was brilliant
Putting it closer to the top of my list… so many books, so little time (even tho’ I’m retired!).
The moral dilemma Dana has to face in Kindred is something that sticks with you. That book never quite leaves you. Plus it listed as sci-fi, but it crosses many genres so I always tell those that say I don’t like sci-fi, read it I promise you will like it!
Animal Farm
The Help
Lord of the Flies
Loved THE HELP. I know quite a bit about the the other two but never had the urge to read them.
Black Like Me
Great book
The Hiding Place by CorrietenBoom
Billie Graham’s campaign for youth in WV showed that free when I was a teenager in Bluefield I think.
@Bonnie When CorrietenBoom got out of Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, all her family were dead. When Billy Graham asked her to travel with his group, she did. If you are in Amsterdam, visit her home. When I went we sat in a circle. We all shared how CorrietenBoom had impacted our lives. The group leader shared about her family. We got to go into The Hiding Place. It was powerful and frightening. Her beloved sister died in the concentration camp.
Just Mercy is excellent.
To Kill a Mockingbird is fabulous. I found A Thousand Splendid Suns to be a real eye opener about the suppression of women/girls after the Taliban took back control of Afghanistan after it had been under Russian rule.
Also Little Bee a very complex story about the Nigerian oil dispute and children seeking asylum from the ravages of war. Both still haunt me.
Loved Little Bee. It was absolutely heart wrenching.
It really was. I was stunned with the ending.
I agree with “The Grapes of Wrath” and “To Kill a Mockingbird”. Maybe I missed it being mentioned, but I’d like to toss “The Outsiders” into the mix. The differences society sees in the rich “Socs” and the poor “Greasers”, though underneath, they were in many ways the same, like digging sunsets and liking movies.
@Kathy I just had a conversation with my son about this story. It resonates as much today as it did then.
It was a favorite of my daughter’s when she discovered it in middle school. I enjoyed rereading it at that time so we could discuss it and it turned into a compare/contrast of then and now for us. We lived in an area that had the highest income level in the country at that time and we weren’t in that top income bracket. It was an interesting situation and fortunately we benefited from the situation since it was a lovely area with lots to enjoy freely and most wealthy people included the middle and lower classes in their world. Of course, there were clashes between teens and I worked at the public high school so saw that. There was a council of students, educators and parents that worked constantly on inclusion of all students in school and community activities, which was working. I felt I was living in a very healthy place and was glad we weren’t living as outsiders.
That is very interesting. My area had the haves and have nots. However, early on you knew where your place was and just made the most of it. However, I loved the community and felt good about raising my kids there. I, too, was a teacher but at the elementary level. My kids saw conflict in Jr. High and High School that I was
oblivious to. I think many of us saw what we wanted to.
@Cindy That can happen, too.
I have at least these 3: Enrique’s Journey about immigrants who cross from Mexico, Deer Hunting with Jesus by Joe Bageant (who I broke bread with as the book uses my current town as the premise), and Hillbilly Elegy.
Evicted: Poverty and Profit by Matthew Desmond
I read this book…I felt every story he told…it is HARD TO BE POOR IN AMERICA
Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson; Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead; A Lesson Before Dying, Gaines; Mountains Beyond Mountains, Tracy Kidder; Dickens, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, anything by Jesmyn Ward
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, is such an under rated book. Is fabulous and insightful. It teaches science, legal ownership and the rights or lack of rights of the poor. It was a book that stayed with me a long time.
@Elba me, too!
Agree
This has been an excellent discussion and I have another long list to read. Thanks everyone.
Would The Handmaid’s Tale qualify? Found it socially challenging.
The Book of Unknown Americans
Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry
a wonderful book
The Soul of America
Small Great Things. There were moments I had to set it down but by that time I was committed to finish. I was so glad I stayed till the end
The Essay. This was covered in one of our “One Book One Community “ reads. Excellent discussion
The Color Of Water by James McBride
I am currently reading: White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of our Racial Divide. It is on my mind all the time
I would like to add A Long walk to Water. It may be a YA selection, but it’s a complete masterpiece. I didn’t learn about the African continent growing up and I wish I had.
A Civil Action a very good book about citizens having to fight for clean water.
Also Night by Elie Weisel and the Diary of Anne Frank such strong characters that have stayed with me.
Lastly non fiction Devil in the Grove- I consider it a must read for anyone to truly understand how the shackles of slavery permeated our laws and our people of Florida. Although a difficult read for me I feel like I learned so much that applies to my world today- migrant farm workers, immigration and segregation.
A long walk to water is amazing
The Grapes of Wrath, but also 12 Years a Slave
The New Jim Crow
To Kill A Mockingbird, The Book Thief, The Help, Killers of the Flower Moon, The Hate U Give, Beyond the Beautiful Forevers
Beyond the Beautiful Forevers is great. The slum behind the high rise hotels in… Mumbai?? Nonfiction that reads like fiction, focuses on several families. Heart wrenching.
@Denise, exactly. Incredible narrative nonfiction. Gripped my heart.
Grapes of Wrath…. read my junior year of high school.
The Immoral Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Immortal?
@Denise Yep- hope it was a typo
@Denise yes!
Just Mercy is being filmed in Montgomery; the film starts Michael B. Jordan as Mr. Stevenson & Jamie Fox as Mr. McMillian.
Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert Heinlein