NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • In this beautifully written masterwork, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author chronicles one of the great untold stories of American history: the decades-long migration of black citizens who fled the South for northern and western cities, in search of a better life.NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people … 1970, this exodus of almost six million people changed the face of America. Wilkerson compares this epic migration to the migrations of other peoples in history. She interviewed more than a thousand people, and gained access to new data and official records, to write this definitive and vividly dramatic account of how these American journeys unfolded, altering our cities, our country, and ourselves.
With stunning historical detail, Wilkerson tells this story through the lives of three unique individuals: Ida Mae Gladney, who in 1937 left sharecropping and prejudice in Mississippi for Chicago, where she achieved quiet blue-collar success and, in old age, voted for Barack Obama when he ran for an Illinois Senate seat; sharp and quick-tempered George Starling, who in 1945 fled Florida for Harlem, where he endangered his job fighting for civil rights, saw his family fall, and finally found peace in God; and Robert Foster, who left Louisiana in 1953 to pursue a medical career, the personal physician to Ray Charles as part of a glitteringly successful medical career, which allowed him to purchase a grand home where he often threw exuberant parties.
Wilkerson brilliantly captures their first treacherous and exhausting cross-country trips by car and train and their new lives in colonies that grew into ghettos, as well as how they changed these cities with southern food, faith, and culture and improved them with discipline, drive, and hard work. Both a riveting microcosm and a major assessment, The Warmth of Other Suns is a bold, remarkable, and riveting work, a superb account of an “unrecognized immigration” within our own land. Through the breadth of its narrative, the beauty of the writing, the depth of its research, and the fullness of the people and lives portrayed herein, this book is destined to become a classic.
MARK LYNTON HISTORY PRIZE WINNER
HEARTLAND AWARD WINNER
DAYTON LITERARY PEACE PRIZE FINALIST
NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY
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NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY
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I thought I was fairly well-versed in American history but I knew nothing about the Great Migration of Black Americans out of the Jim Crow states. Isabel Wilkerson taught me what I should have known but did not. She did it with personal narratives that I can hold onto. Her book informs me like no classroom or history textbook ever could.
This is an important, beautifully written MUST READ!! It is one of my all time favorite books!!!
Excellently researched and thoughtfully put together. A part of American history that is, sadly, not taught in schools. This book is very well written and hard to put down.
One of the greatest books ever written. The trajectory of so many families in the US is tied to the Great Migration. Would you have become who you are had you stayed where you were? TWoOS definitely informs many of my stories.
This is a must-read book for anyone living in the US. Wilkerson’s super in-depth case studies chronicle the lives of three southern African Americans who migrate north during 3 different decades in the 20th century, ending up in LA, Chicago and NYC
A must!
“The Warmth of Other Suns” is a historical masterpiece offering a riveting account of Black Americans and their migration from the South. One of the top five books I’ve read in my lifetime.
Very informative about the migration of Blacks from the South.
Heartbreaking, inspiring, painstakingly researched, and beautifully written. Highly recommend.
I actually found this book difficult to read. Not because of the writing but because of the subject. I learned horrific things that have changed me in important ways.
This is a great non-fiction book and it is full of so much information. The migration of African Americans from the south to the north is a fascinating story. This is truly a page turner.
This book is excellent and I highly recommend it. Without a doubt the best book I have read this year. I learned a greAt deal about the South in the first half of the twentieth century and they are stories that need to be told
Makes a major historical period accessible through close reporting of three who were part of it. History as gripping as a novel.
Very well written, and very informative. Recommend to everyone who cares about righting wrongs, wearing ‘another’s shoes’ for a while, and needs some empathy to understand events that created inflammatory emotions of today. We all have a hand in it whether we know it or not.
Loved it!! What a wonderful read
This page turner will grip your attention and interest. Well written. A historical book that reads like a novel. It was a book I didn’t want to see end. Very touching story.
I had never heard of the Great Migration of the oppressed people under Jim Crow laws. This book was an amazing, eye-opener for me. I was a little privileged white girl living in the North when some of this was going on.
A must read
I loved this book. It opened my eyes and heart to understanding an appreciating the black experience in this country of ours. Real characters that you could empathize with. I would make it required reading in every high school.
A bit too much repetition.