Coming of Age in Mississippi: The Classic Autobiography of Growing Up Poor and Black in the Rural South

My freedom hat comes off to Anne Moody. A great read on the early struggles of civil rights in this country .

Took me down a rabbit while off historical fiction. The details were so realistic I felt like I was actually there watching in the background !!

I have read many books of 1st hand accounts of living in the Jim Crowe South. Annes accounts put you there. I was crying,angry and cheering all the way throughI couldn't put it down. As a middle aged white person born in the north I have read many historical 1st person books on living and trying to survive as a black person in the south. Anne was determined and fearless at a young age. Determined not to live as her mama and others hand to mouth.starving,working for a few $s a day. She knew there was more to life and she sacrificed herself to prove it. I have nothing but respect for her and her attempts and passion to change life for the better.I had no idea she was one of the sit ins at the Woolworths lunch counter.

I was really interesting to see the growth of moody so much is four years old to a college student. At first I was dreading readiness but it was a good story.

Story of a young African American girl, Annie Moody, growing up in poor, rural, racist Mississippi in the 40's and 50's. whole the family is as poor as possible, Annie is hugely smart. She excels at school, is a top athlete, and clearly stands out from her peers. She is able to find work as a maid working for white women in town, which alleviates her family's poverty a little.However, these advantages also mean that unlikely of her peers, Annie understands just how bad the racism is that controls every aspect of her life. As the violence increases (apparently after Brown is decided), Annie leaves town, first to work in new Orleans, and them to go to college in Jackson, Mississippi.During college, she joins a air in at the local Woolworth lunch counter--one of the first in the Deep South. It makes national news, which means Annie can not go home again, for her own safety and that of her family. Instead, she joins the movement full time, working in another small town deep in southwest Mississippi.This IS an autobiography, told very much fe Annie's point of view. Big changes were happening nationally, but this book refuses to put Annie's life in context. Instead, we hear about outside events only when Annie does. This can be frustrating--and I imagine it would be much more so if the reader doesn't a general familiarity with the timeline of the civil rights movement.The flip side is that the narrative rings absolutely authentic. By sticking to Annie's point of view, the reader is drawn into her world, and sees that world as Annie experienced it.

This is the amazing story of Anne Moody, a Civil Rights worker who was in the forefront of the Movement from the first sit-ins in her native Mississippi. I cannot express how deeply I have been touched by reading her account of her earliest memories of searing poverty and hunger, and abuse at the hands of other family members. Her deep sensitivity to her environs, and to her own intellect have often taken her to the brink of breaking down, but her true inner strength always kept her going. No matter how discouraged and bitter she felt toward the Movement, not only in the South, but all over the U.S., and especially the government, she persevered for the sake of freedom. This is only the very tip of the iceberg - you have to read her full story to completely understand and comprehend the terror, the debasement and inhumanity that was displayed throughout the South during this tumultuous time in our history. Her first-hand account provides us with the unvarnished truth of what living through those times was like, for blacks as well as the few whites who also believed in the Movement. I wish I could meet her in person and thank her for taking the time to recall painful memories and putting pen to paper to keep the truth alive. This book should be part of all high school curricula-we must never forget this time in our history, and we must never allow for it or any other type of prejudice and discrimination to occur within our borders ever again.

This book is one of the best memoirs I have ever had the pleasure of reading, if not the best. Moody has got a whole lot of what I can only refer to as intestinal fortitude. Her bravery in writing this account of her life growing up in a racist Mississippi is reminiscent of the mother who demanded an open casket at her son's funeral (Emmett Till). Both women were concerned with making the world look at its own ugliness.What I truly appreciate is that Moody is mad, and this comes out continually through her prose, but she DOES NOT SENTIMENTALIZE.She has a way with words and emotions that will put you on the scene and her relation of her time in college and in the Black Movement are particularly poignant. When you read this work, you too, will be mad--and if you are anything like me, you will find yourself in wonder of how such conditions could have existed only 40-50 years ago. This autobiography, sets in stone if you will, the account of blatant and brutal murders and abuses that took place against blacks everyday in the South. You will come away from this work with an education and perhaps a heavy heart...but the close of the book does allow for one thing: a glimmer of hope.This memoir should be compulsory reading for every American citizen. It gives us all the information our American history books conveniently left out.Buy this one!

This book was amazing. To think that such a young woman wrote this book in the 1960's. It was hearfelt, interesting and incredibly heart wrenching at times. It was well written, although in places it did seem to over describe, however, this is a good book for anyone who wants to get a view of the civil rights era through a person's eye rather than a history book.

Item as described, No problems. Would buy from this vendor again.

Unable to put this book down. What spirit our heroine had. It was fascinating to see how she gradually became aware of the inequalities in the South and how her determination grew to abolish them.

I really enjoyed reading this. Thanks a lot!

The quality of the product was fab, delivery was quick, so couldn't have asked for anything more. It is also one of the best books I have ever read.