Michael K. Honey

I hate it when I read a book and I then struggle to say much about it. So let me try and force a bunch of words out for no other reason than I got this book for free in exchange for a review, and so I will keep my promise and review it.

So I read To The Promised Land, spurred on by a comment from a university course I took many years ago: Most people know Martin Luther King Jr. from his anti-segregation work and his I Have A Dream speech (and looky looky -- I reviewed a book about that speech a few years ago) from 1963. He was assassinated in 1968. So there's five years where, for the most part, the popular narrative stops. Why? Because he spent a lot of those five years advocating not just for civil-rights for African Americans, but also advocating for the poor, against classicism, and working with unions. And while voting rights and desegregation was one thing, working for economic equality was a whole other kettle of fish.

And so, I got To The Promised Land because of that university professor many years ago and because To The Promised Land has a sub (under?) title: Martin Luther King and the Fight for Economic Justice. Okay. So I was going to learn about those missing five years.

So I did. I read To The Promised Land (in April, and now it's June). I made precisely zero notes on my kobo. I highlighted nothing. I read it and I remember basically nothing. My fault for being disengaged with the process or the book's fault for informing without captivating me with language or story-telling or whatever it was that didn't have the words worm their way deep into my brain? But this is the second book in a row about someone working to make the world better that I've read to which my response has been a precisely mid-range, not-even-angry-about-it, meh.

Martin Luther King Jr. tried to make the world better for all Americans, then they shot him, and that makes me sad. Later I read a book about him. There was a sanitation strike in the book. He still got shot. I am still sad, but I do know that my being sad is not really what this is all about. Still sad though. Still a big blank space in my brain where this book should have gone. Sorry.

To The Promised Land by Michael K. Honey went on sale April 3, 2018.

I received a copy free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.… (altro)