QUICK REVIEWS pt. VI

Hello my lovely readers! While the whole house is sick as dogs right now, I managed to sum up the little strength I had to write some quick reviews. Let's get into it.

Medical Bondage: Race, Gender and the Origins of American Gynecology by Deidre Cooper Owens
This book breaks new ground by exploring how and why physicians denied enslaved women their full humanity yet valued them as "medical superbodies" highly suited for medical experimentation. Cooper Owens examines how gynecologists created and disseminated medical fictions about their patients, such as their belief that black enslaved women could withstand pain better than white "ladies."

*An incredibly sad, but powerful and important read. Absolutely well done. 4 out of 5 stars

Mother Emanuel: Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church by Kevin Sack
A sweeping history of one of the nation’s most important African American churches and a profound story of courage and grace amid the fight for racial justice.

*Another sad but important read. A wealth of AME knowledge and Black history in this book. I only wish it included more about the victims of the 2015 shooting and their stories. 4 out of 5 stars

Black Soldiers, White Laws: The Tragedy of the 24th Infantry in 1917 Houston by John A. Haymond

Hello my lovely readers! 

I. LOVED. THIS. BOOK. It's about time that I dip my toe into more military history. Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS
On the sweltering, rainy night of August 23, 1917, one of the most consequential events affecting America’s long legacy of racism and injustice began in Houston, Texas. Inflamed by a rumor that a white mob was arming to attack their cantonment, and by regular police harassment in the preceding weeks, more than 100 African American soldiers of the 3rd Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, took their weapons and marched into the largely Black San Felipe district of the city. A violent confrontation with police and civilians ensued and nineteen lives were lost.

The Army took charge, conducting a court-martial of the 118 soldiers on charges of mutiny and murder. Inadequately defended en masse by only one lawyer inexperienced in capital cases, undermined by perjured testimony and clear racial bias, and confronted by an all-white tribunal committed to a rapid judgment, sixty-four Black soldiers were found guilty. And in the predawn darkness of December 11th, thirteen of them were hanged at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio—extra-legally and in secret, violating even the Army’s own regulations. The largest mass execution in the Army’s history outraged the country and inspired preventive legislation, and yet six more Black soldiers were executed in early 1918 and dozens more sentenced to life in prison.

The Houston Incident, as it became known, has remained largely untold, a deep stain on the Army’s record and pride. Award-winning historian and Army veteran John Haymond has spent eight years researching the events surrounding the Incident and engaging in efforts that ultimately led, in December 2023, to overturning the verdicts and awarding honorary discharges to all the soldiers involved. His dramatic chronicle of what transpired, situated amongst the rampant racism in Texas and the country, is a crucially important and harrowing reminder of our racially violent past, offering the promise that justice, even posthumously, can prevail.

QUICK REVIEWS pt. V

Hello my lovely readers! It's time for another round of Quick Reviews! 

We Don't Talk about Carol by Kristen L. Berry
A dedicated journalist unearths a generations-old family secret—and a connection to a string of missing girls that hits way too close to home.

*This was a great debut! A little long and the author definitely could've cut half of the fertility plot out, but enjoyable nonetheless. I'm glad there's finally a book out that addresses the plight of missing Black girls. 4 out of 5 stars

The Ghostwriter by Julie Clark
In June 1975, the Taylor family shatters when two out of their three teenagers are found dead. The only surviving sibling, Vincent, never shakes the rumors that he was the one who killed them. Now, decades later, his daughter, Olivia, comes back to serve as his ghostwriter for his last book and uncover the truth of what happened that night.

*Decent read. Not terrible, not great. Pretty average. 3 out of 5 stars

DOUBLE REVIEW: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown and the Heartbeat of Wounded Knee by David Treuer

 

Hello my lovely readers! I read these two books back to back and it was honestly a coincidence that I happened to read them during Native American Heritage month. I've had these two books for month and finally got around it them! Let's get into it!

SYNOPSIS
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is Dee Brown's eloquent, fully documented account of the systematic destruction of the American Indian during the second half of the nineteenth century. A national bestseller in hardcover for more than a year after its initial publication, it has sold almost four million copies and has been translated into seventeen languages. For this elegant thirtieth-anniversary edition—published in both hardcover and paperback—Brown has contributed an incisive new preface.

Using council records, autobiographies, and firsthand descriptions, Brown allows the great chiefs and warriors of the Dakota, Ute, Sioux, Cheyenne, and other tribes to tell us in their own words of the battles, massacres, and broken treaties that finally left them demoralized and defeated. A unique and disturbing narrative told with force and clarity, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee changed forever our vision of how the West was really won.


In The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee, Treuer melds history with reportage and memoir. Tracing the tribes' distinctive cultures from first contact, he explores how the depredations of each era spawned new modes of survival. The devastating seizures of land gave rise to increasingly sophisticated legal and political maneuvering that put the lie to the myth that Indians don't know or care about property. The forced assimilation of their children at government-run boarding schools incubated a unifying Native identity. Conscription in the US military and the pull of urban life brought Indians into the mainstream and modern times, even as it steered the emerging shape of self-rule and spawned a new generation of resistance. The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee is the essential, intimate story of a resilient people in a transformative era.