Reviews provided by Syndetics
Library Journal Review
More than 60 years after Emmett Till's brutal lynching in Mississippi, his name and story still resonate, the outline of which is well known to most: Till, a 14-year-old African American boy from Chicago-unversed, the story goes, in the ways of the Jim Crow South-whistled at a white woman, whose husband and brother-in-law later kidnapped, tortured, and killed him, dumping his body in the Tallahatchie River. Their guilt known to all, the murderers were nonetheless acquitted by an all-white, all-male jury. This was, of course, hardly the first time that such a miscarriage of justice prevailed, and it was one of the driving factors of the Great Migration. Black people were not merely seeking economic opportunities up North; they were fleeing racist terrorism, stoked by the ubiquitous White Citizens' Councils that formed in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education, in May 1954. With damning clarity, Tyson situates Till's murder squarely in this context and calls for us to confront our legacy of racist violence because "America," he writes, "is still killing Emmett Till." Unfortunately, the storytelling is marred by a stilted narration by Rhett S. Price. VERDICT A detailed account that skillfully treads familiar ground.["Highly readable.likely to remain the final account of the Till murder and trial and its impact in the United States and abroad": LJ 12/16 review of the S. & S. hc.]-Erin Hollaway Palmer, Richmond © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publishers Weekly Review
Reader Price has a deep, alluring voice reminiscent of old radio announcers. He brings an authentic-sounding Southern accent to the reading of historian Tyson's latest books,which revisits the 1955 murder of Emmett Till and the legacy of his tragic death in the civil rights movement. But Price has been given the near-impossible task of creating unique voices for innumerable figures: both men and women, old and young, black and white, Southern and Northern. Sometimes these voice characterizations fit smoothly into the narrative, but some distract the listener. (He even tries some unconvincing accents for the few foreigners quoted in the book: German, Czech, French, Italian, Dutch.) Still, his reading thrusts listeners into the horror of 14-year-old Emmett Till's murder, the trial of his murderers, the wisdom and strength of his mother's actions, and the role of Till's death in the ensuing civil rights struggles. A Simon & Schuster hardcover. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
CHOICE Review
Tyson (Univ. of North Carolina) uses thorough research, a gift for storytelling, newly assembled evidence, and a personal commitment and passion to produce a stunning account of the lynching of Emmett Till, one of the most significant events of the 20th-century civil rights movement. He documents how mid-20th-century cultural assumptions justified the violent suppression of African Americans to keep "inferior" citizens in their place. The brutal lynchers later explained that they meant the tortured killing of Till to be a pillar marking the white supremacy social order. Tyson argues that Till's mother's controversial decision to expose her son's abused body in an open casket funeral invigorated the civil rights movement and focused attention on the culture of abuse from that date forward. It was not what the lynchers, acquitted by the Mississippi courts, anticipated. With new evidence that the charges against Till were falsified, Tyson shows that the 1950s national culture accepted the use of violence to suppress minorities. He also shows, however, that seeds of integrity could sprout in churches, labor unions, and some law and judicial offices and is careful to reveal the personal context of the villains, heroines and heroes, and victims of the drama. This is important revisionist history vital to explaining American culture. Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries. --James Howell Smith, Wake Forest University
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Although much has been written about the tragic death of young Emmett Till in 1955 Mississippi, Tyson offers new perspectives in this searing account, which is especially relevant today given the Black Lives Matter movement and the rise of the so-called alt-right and its echoes of white supremacy. Tyson features an interview with Carolyn Bryant, the white woman at the center of the case. The now-80-year-old Bryant, who has not been one to open her doors to journalists, agreed to meet with Tyson over cake and coffee to talk about what happened that violent night so long ago. Nothing that boy did could ever justify what happened to him, she told him. Tyson himself describes Till as a lovable, playful, and somewhat mischievous child but essentially well-behaved who grew up in segregated Chicago. He meticulously describes the incident that changed so many lives; the kidnapping and horrific murder of Till; the trial, including recovered court transcripts; and the funeral, back in Chicago. Tyson makes a direct link between Till's murder and anger over the Supreme Court's 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision. Till's death, he concludes, was an extreme example of the logic of America's national racial caste system and continues to be a national metaphor for racial injustice. An indispensable inquiry.--Sawyers, June Copyright 2017 Booklist
Kirkus Book Review
A scholar of Southern history and culture expands on the saga of a racially motivated 1955 murder that resonated around the globe and helped spawn the political activism of courageous blacks in Mississippi and other former slave states.Emmett Till was the murder victim, a 14-year-old black male from Chicago visiting relatives in rural Mississippi. The targeting of Till by white racists began with supposedly inappropriate remarks he made to a 21-year-old white female shopkeeper. Decades later, Tyson (Blood Done Sign My Name, 2004), a senior research scholar at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies, located and interviewed that woman, Carolyn Bryant Donham. From that interview, bolstered by prodigious research, the author determined that Bryant (her maiden name) was an unreliable witness, almost certainly exaggerating Till's alleged disrespectful conduct in the store. She now regrets that her testimony led to his murder by at least two relatives, with maybe others directly involved: "Nothing that boy did could justify what happened to him." For those who have read previous books about the Till murderand there are plentynot much else in Tyson's book is likely to constitute fresh news. Nonetheless, the well-presented details on the buildup to the murder, the incident in the store, the brutality of the killers, the mostly pro forma law enforcement investigation, the trial of the two defendants, and their unsurprising acquittals add atmosphere. In addition, Tyson is masterful at explaining how the Till murder became a major cause of the civil rights movement. Especially resonant today is the author's focus on obtaining voting rights for blacks in Southern states that denied those rights before the Till murder. "America is still killing Emmett Till," he writes, "and often for the same reasons that drove the violent segregationists of the 1950s and 1960s." Tyson skillfully demonstrates how, in our allegedly post-racial country, a "national racial caste system" remains in place. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.