By Jason Reynolds

This is a book that will change how you may look at history. It shines a light on the racial inequality that is happening in the United States, and the fact that it started way long ago. The author does a great job of speaking to you -the reader. So you will read something and then he will say “Pause and think about that for a moment.” I really enjoyed reading it because of the format, it’s not like any history book I have read before.

There are three definitions that you need to know as you read and dive into our past. The Segregationists (“the real haters”), the assimilationists people who like you (Black people), but only with quotation marks”—because you’re “like” them, and the antiracists “they love you because you’re like you”. It seems that rarely do we fit into one category. Instead, “over the course of a lifetime and (even over the course of a day), people can take on and act out ideas represented by more than one of these three identities. Can be both, and” (p. 3-4).

Jason Reynolds is a favorite author of mine, and that is one of the reasons I choose it. This book is a great example of the power of writing. At the end of the book, readers are charged to make a difference, and do what we can to make a change.