A Walk Through Fire

Rating:
Summary: Nice book
Review: I read an earlier edition of this book a few years ago and am so glad to see it re-released. I have lived in the South all my life, through the time and in the kinds of places where this novel is set--a small Alabama town during the early sixties. This novel broadened my knowledge of how different people from different walks of life experienced this time. Characters are drawn with sensitivity and compassion, and the reader can sympathize with those on both sides of the struggle. They are not stereotypical, as I know that whites and "rednecks" were not all the same and not all anti-black, and not all African Americans were the same. The characters play themselves out in a very tragic and engaging plot that carried me back to my childhood, making me feel both pride and shame in being a white person from Alabama. Cobb does an especially good job handling the shifts from present to past (flashbacks). A friend of mine was writing a "Civil Rights novel" using flashbacks, and I referred him to A Walk Through Fire as an example of how they can be done well.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging story about the South in the early Civil Rights Era
Review: I read an earlier edition of this book a few years ago and am so glad to see it re-released. I have lived in the South all my life, through the time and in the kinds of places where this novel is set--a small Alabama town during the early sixties. This novel broadened my knowledge of how different people from different walks of life experienced this time. Characters are drawn with sensitivity and compassion, and the reader can sympathize with those on both sides of the struggle. They are not stereotypical, as I know that whites and "rednecks" were not all the same and not all anti-black, and not all African Americans were the same. The characters play themselves out in a very tragic and engaging plot that carried me back to my childhood, making me feel both pride and shame in being a white person from Alabama. Cobb does an especially good job handling the shifts from present to past (flashbacks). A friend of mine was writing a "Civil Rights novel" using flashbacks, and I referred him to A Walk Through Fire as an example of how they can be done well.

Rating:
Summary: Nice book
Review: This book is mainly about civil disobedience and a white man who sided with Blacks. It takes place in Alabama during the sixties. Sometimes the book moved very slowly, but overall it was a great novel. There are many subplots such as love stories contained within the real plot. This leaves the reader thinking more and more.