Why am I passionate about this?

I spent the last eleven years listening to people describe the worst day of their lives and how they found the grace and courage to persevere. Little in my professional training as a historian prepared me to sit with them and help them make sense of their past. Each of these books offers pathways to recapturing a violent past and imagining how we keep living. 


I wrote

Bloody Tuesday: The Untold Story of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Tuscaloosa

By John M. Giggie,

Book cover of Bloody Tuesday: The Untold Story of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Tuscaloosa

What is my book about?

For 60 years, Black citizens in Tuscaloosa have begged city and state leaders to tell the truth about one of…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

The books I picked & why

Book cover of Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption

John M. Giggie Why did I love this book?

I worked with members of Stevenson’s staff to research victims of lynching in Tuscaloosa in 2016 and heard him preach at First African Baptist as part of a commemoration service.

His call that day, amplified in this book, was to confront histories of racial violence and discrimination and ask why–why do they exist, why do we avoid them? He promised that the search for answers would change us, as it had him–make us more empathetic and critical about the truth of our shared past. I believed him. 

By Bryan Stevenson,

Why should I read it?

12 authors picked Just Mercy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE, STARRING MICHAEL B. JORDAN, JAMIE FOXX, AND BRIE LARSON.

A NEW YORK TIMES, WASHINGTON POST, BOSTON GLOBE, ESQUIRE, AND TIME BOOK OF THE YEAR.

A #1 New York Times bestseller, this is a powerful, true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix America's broken justice system, as seen in the HBO documentary True Justice.

The US has the highest rate of incarceration in the world. One in every 15 people born there today is expected to go to prison. For black men this figure rises to one…


Book cover of Beloved

John M. Giggie Why did I love this book?

It is hard to forget the ghosts and spirits haunting this book. They register the pain of slavery and dare us to look away. Little in my education as a historian equipped me to engage stories of loss and violence.

Morrison turned to fiction to restore a balanced view of American history, leaving us with a question: what tools do we need to unlock hidden histories? I think about this question every time I write. 

By Toni Morrison,

Why should I read it?

40 authors picked Beloved as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'Toni Morrison was a giant of her times and ours... Beloved is a heart-breaking testimony to the ongoing ravages of slavery, and should be read by all' Margaret Atwood, New York Times

Discover this beautiful gift edition of Toni Morrison's prize-winning contemporary classic Beloved

It is the mid-1800s and as slavery looks to be coming to an end, Sethe is haunted by the violent trauma it wrought on her former enslaved life at Sweet Home, Kentucky. Her dead baby daughter, whose tombstone bears the single word, Beloved, returns as a spectre to punish her mother, but also to elicit her…


Book cover of The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches

John M. Giggie Why did I love this book?

Du Bois taught me how to be a historian. I began reading him while riding a bus home from a summer job in Boston and missed my stop by two miles.

He insisted that scholars engage in struggles for justice and refuse to spend their professional lives behind stacks of books. He demanded that we center the lives of the forgotten in our writing and allow them to tell us how to write history.

These lessons have never left me. 

By W. E. B. Du Bois,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked The Souls of Black Folk as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches is a 1903 work of American literature by W. E. B. Du Bois. It is a seminal work in the history of sociology and a cornerstone of African-American literature.


The book contains several essays on race, some of which had been published earlier in The Atlantic Monthly. To develop this work, Du Bois drew from his own experiences as an African American in American society. Outside of its notable relevance in African-American history, The Souls of Black Folk also holds an important place in social science as one of the early works…


Book cover of Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama: The Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution

John M. Giggie Why did I love this book?

It took McWhorter eighteen years to unlock the secrets of Birmingham, where she grew up. This is the finest local civil rights movement study, a sweeping story of Black courage in the face of repression.

It is also a deeply personal story. Asking why so many whites violently defended the color line, she found her answer hidden deep inside her own family’s history.

By Diane McWhorter,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Carry Me Home as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Now with a new afterword, the Pulitzer Prize-winning dramatic account of the Civil Rights Era’s climactic battle in Birmingham as the movement, led by Martin Luther King, Jr., brought down the institutions of segregation.

"The Year of Birmingham," 1963, was a cataclysmic turning point in America’s long civil rights struggle. Child demonstrators faced down police dogs and fire hoses in huge nonviolent marches against segregation. Ku Klux Klansmen retaliated by bombing the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, killing four young black girls. Diane McWhorter, daughter of a prominent Birmingham family, weaves together police and FBI records, archival documents, interviews with black…


Book cover of All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley's Sack, a Black Family Keepsake

John M. Giggie Why did I love this book?

Miles made me demand more of history. She writes a fascinating tale of love and belonging based on sources outside formal archives.

The book warns us about the dangers of blindly accepting traditional ways of writing history. It reminds us that we must seek new approaches to representing the past if we ever hope to tell broader, more truthful stories.   

By Tiya Miles,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked All That She Carried as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER * NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * WINNER OF THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE

'A remarkable book' - Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times
'A brilliant exercise in historical excavation and recovery' - Annette Gordon-Reed, author of The Hemingses of Monticello
'A history told with brilliance and tenderness and fearlessness' - Jill Lepore, author of These Truths: A History of the United States

In 1850s South Carolina, Rose, an enslaved woman, faced a crisis: the imminent sale of her daughter Ashley. Thinking quickly, she packed a cotton bag with a few items. Soon after, the nine-year-old girl was…


Explore my book 😀

Bloody Tuesday: The Untold Story of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Tuscaloosa

By John M. Giggie,

Book cover of Bloody Tuesday: The Untold Story of the Struggle for Civil Rights in Tuscaloosa

What is my book about?

For 60 years, Black citizens in Tuscaloosa have begged city and state leaders to tell the truth about one of the most violent days in the civil rights movement. They wanted the world to know that on June 9, 1964, police and Klansmen brutalized over 500 Black people huddled inside First African Baptist Church. They called it Bloody Tuesday.

It remains the largest assault and invasion of a Black church by law enforcement during the civil rights movement. More were injured and arrested than on Bloody Sunday in Selma eight months later. This is one of the last great untold stories of the civil rights movement, covered up by the city and state for generations until now. 

Book cover of Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
Book cover of Beloved
Book cover of The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,206

readers submitted
so far, will you?

You might also like...

All They Need to Know

By Eileen Goudge,

Book cover of All They Need to Know

Eileen Goudge Author Of All They Need to Know

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

Author Baker

Eileen's 3 favorite reads in 2023

What is my book about?

On the run from her abusive husband, Kyra Smith hits the road. Destination unknown. With a dog she rescued in tow, she lands in the peaceful California mountain town of Gold Creek and is immediately befriended by an openhearted group of women who call themselves the Tattooed Ladies. They’re there for Kyra—and for each other.

The maternal Frannie is a tattoo artist struggling with a troubled daughter. Suzy is a self-described fashionista grandma bearing a painful estrangement from her son. Then there’s Jo, whose storybook marriage is shadowed by a grim medical diagnosis. And bookstore owner Marisol. She longs for…

All They Need to Know

By Eileen Goudge,

What is this book about?

A woman escaping a violent past finds new friendships, romance, and tenuous sanctuary in an emotionally gripping novel by New York Times bestselling author Eileen Goudge.

On the run from her abusive husband, Kyra Smith hits the road. Destination unknown. With a neglected dog she rescued in tow, she lands in the peaceful California town of Gold Creek and is immediately befriended by an openhearted group of women called the Tattooed Ladies Club. They're there for Kyra-and for each other.

The maternal Frannie is a tattoo artist struggling with a troubled daughter. Suzy is a self-described fashionista grandma bearing a…


5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in African Americans, criminal justice, and slaves?

African Americans 808 books
Criminal Justice 48 books
Slaves 106 books