Reading this book in its entirely helped me experience for myself how important it is for those who make decisions about the fate of a challenged book to read the whole book. Others who are lucky enough to escape such experiences can develop empathy for those who do experience them. However, I know there are students out there who are living realities of similar racism, abuse, and violence, and will find this book a healthy way to process those experiences and become change makers for the future.

One might say that a high school or middle school student should not be exposed to such content. This is historical fiction intended to reveal the darker sides of history, the racism and abuse that live on today, perhaps in part because nobody wants to talk about it.

Nothing in the book felt gratuitous, but rather purposeful. It was also very well-written and the disturbing content written in such a way that a naive reader might miss most of it entirely. The book actually had more disturbing sexual and violent content than I expected. I had a short conversation online with the author (who is a cousin of my teacher friend) in which she explained her reasoning for the content in question. history.I read this book because it has been challenged at my children’s school district and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. The work resonates with fear, hope, love, and the importance of memory….Set against the backdrop of an actual historical event, Pérez…gives voice to many long-omitted facets of U.S. “This book presents a range of human nature, from kindness and love to acts of racial and sexual violence. “Pérez deftly weaves unflinchingly intense narrative….A powerful, layered tale of forbidden love in times of unrelenting racism.”―starred, Kirkus Reviews

“ layered tale of color lines, love and struggle in an East Texas oil town is a pit-in-the-stomach family drama that goes down like it should, with pain and fascination, like a mix of sugary medicine and artisanal moonshine.”- The New York Times Book Review Ashley Hope Pérez takes the facts of the 1937 New London school explosion-the worst school disaster in American history-as a backdrop for a riveting novel about segregation, love, family, and the forces that destroy people. But sometimes the attraction between two people is so powerful it breaks through even the most entrenched color lines.

Naomi Vargas and Wash Fuller know about the lines in East Texas as well as anyone.

Out of darkness book perez