All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes Book

This was the first book in this year's Postal Book Swap F rotation, all secret until we've all seen all of them. I picked this up to read the same day I spoke to a woman working at a permanent refugee camp in Malawi, and I read the first half without a break. I couldn't stop reading!

Maya Angelou is so engaging. It isn't surprising that a poet would write so lyrically, but there are moments that are so beautifully written.

I didn't know about this period of Angelou's life, about her disillusionment with Martin Luther King, Jr., or that she was internationally known even in the 1960s/.

Her honesty and exploration of identity seems to be the core of the book. Can Black Americans find roots in Africa? Can it be a returned homeland? Or does their Americanness and pain-history separate them too distinctly? Will she find acceptance and belonging?

This book feels like an ancestor itself, to books like Americanah and Homegoing.

Thanks Kim!

Date read is February 17, 2017. Date included below is review posting date.