Saving Our Sons [Paperback]

Marita Golden (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 1995

Sharing her own experiences with raising her African-American son against the backdrop of a racially divided society, the author confronts the causes of violence surrounding African-American men while addressing the problems faced by growing boys. Reprint. Tour.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

In a sensitive and beautifully written autobiographical testimony, novelist Golden (Long Distance Life, LJ 9/1/89) interweaves diary entries with her exploration of what it means to parent a black male adolescent in the turmoil of today's society. Her understanding is heightened by the fact that for the first decade of his life she raised her son in Nigeria, a country largely free of racism and violence that reveres young males. Golden's fears and hopes make the problems of crime and violence, racism, and parenting very real. A book whose readership should not be limited to African Americans, this is strongly recommended for every library.
--Kay Brodie, Chesapeake College, Wye Mills, Md.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

For many Americans, random violence remains a theoretical threat; for young black men--and their parents--in our cities, however, sudden death looms as "a visible, intruding, unruly ghost." Novelist Golden's first book, Migrations of the Heart (1987), was a memoir of her years in her husband's native Nigeria and of the birth of their son. In Saving Our Sons, Golden describes the journey she and son Michael have taken over the past ten years--divorce and return to the U.S., his childhood into adolescence, remarriage, and a reconciliatory visit to Nigeria. Moreover, Golden probes the "season of blood and ashes" the African American community now faces: a cascade of violence that calls into question the real victories of the civil rights movement, a situation requiring a two-front struggle against both racism and black-on-black violence. Golden uses her own journal and interviews with the parents of kids killed and kids who killed to give shape to her narrative of one parent's search for ways to help her son and "all our sons" live into adulthood. Saving Our Sons is a powerful and eloquent call to action on a critical social problem. Mary Carroll --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Anchor (December 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385473036
• ISBN-13: 978-0385473033
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,138,478 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I think I came into the world called to write. I have been a passionate reader and writer since I was a child. Books and language have provided me with a way to live in the world with an enlarged sense of my possibilities. Writing has thrust my personal questions and inner dialogues into the public space. In the process I have inspired others and learned from them through my work.