All you have to know now is that a camera is like your eye. To foccus, keep on eye clocked while you're looking with the other. It brings everything closer. You can hide behind a camera.
It's 1962 and the heat of Jackson, Mississippi, holds more than a potential romance with the wrong kind of boy for fourteen year old Sam. There's also the hand me down dresses and bobby cock from cousin Tine. There's a gift from her mother's new friend, Perry - a balck Asahi Pentax camera. there's their stoic maid, Willa Mae. There are lunch counter sit-ins and black voter registeration drives that turn violent.
In a world that sees only in black and white, this is the year Sam learns to use her camera for shades of gray.
Was This Book Worth My Time?
Without a doubt. McMullan does an amazing job of giving so many raw emotion and detail that you, as a reader, begin to immerse yourself in the story - you become Sam. It is not easy after that to ignore what Sam feels as she and her mother are targeted for being supporters of the African American vote.
I was impressed by the shear amount of history that was intertwined into the book. It never is protrayed as history because you are living it in this book. McMullan is a fantastic writer, and this is a book that I would suggest to my students. It is an easy, but thought-provoking read that does stay with you after you've turned the last page.
What Bothered Me About the Book?
The only thing that bothered me was the realization of how many people suffered during segregation in the south. It is always hard to me grasp history concepts, but this book makes you see just how unjust the actions against African Americans and their white friends were.
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