By Beth Macyand - Truevine: Two Brothers, a Kidnapping, and a Mother's Quest: A True Story of the Jim Crow South (Hardcover) Little, Brown and Company; 1st edition (October 18, 2016) - [Bargain Books] Office Product

I enjoyed this book and though it was a bit different than I was expecting, I learned so much about the curcus, exploitation of people with disabilities and deformaties. I live in Roanoke, Virginia, and to this day, sadly, it remains very much a segregated city. I've often wondered why it is so, and this book actually helped me understand why, starting from how Roanoke came to be, from a village of 500 people. It started up geographically segregated, and racial tensions were extremely high , including every citizen, I'm those days.The story of the brothers touched me, as their lives were ones of unofficial slaves for decades. Their mother was a remarkable woman, showing fierce determination and perseverance to locate her kids, and over the next 40 years, make their lives better. I'd say, she was also a shrewd investor for her era. Wow, she socked money away for the boys and bought land and a home.Enough can't be said of the unspoken hero, Nancy! Loved her big heart which showed throughout the book.Ms. Macy has opened my eyes quite a bit to racial discrimination, and how the African American community is affected.Great book! Highly recommend!Happy ending too.

Living near Roanoke and having read Macy since her reporter days with the Roanoke Times, I am a fan who couldn't wait to get my copy of Truevine once it became available. It is a compelling story with local (to me) history and landmarks. An interesting read!Thoroughly researched, as was Factory Man, Macy comes across as a bit of a crusader for civil rights in her second book. She presented the facts well; I wish she had taken a step back and let the facts speak for themselves once presented, instead of going a step further and becoming an interpreter also.

From the subtitle of this month's book club selection, I assumed I would be reading an interesting story of two brothers who were kidnapped and subjected to some sort of racism, but wow! "Truevine" gives the reader so much more than that. Beth Macy's meticulously researched book tells the poignant tale of two African-American albino brothers who were separated from their family and forced to perform as freaks in circuses. The book also delves into a topic that makes many white readers uncomfortable. Macy paints a disturbing portrait that reveals that even after the Civil War and slavery ended, African-Americans were subjected to insufferable indignities, persecution, and abuse.My only issue with this fascinating book was that, as soon as I read of the children's kidnapping by a man representing a circus, I wanted to know immediately what happened to the young boys. At one point I became so impatient with Mrs. Macy's slow and methodical revelation of the facts, which expanded into many side stories, including the plight of other deformed people who were exploited as sideshow "freaks" and the details of the Jim Crow laws of 20th Century Virginia, that I resorted to Googling the brothers, so I could learn of their fate. Once I had a better idea of what would happen to them, I then settled into the book's sometimes tedious pace, and was motivated to absorb all the author had to offer about the unscrupulous labor practices of circuses and the unjust treatment of African-Americans in my hometown of Roanoke, Virginia, most of which was eye-opening for me. Of course, I knew that schools were segregated when I attended there in the 1950s and 1960s, but the hidden history of racism was not taught in school nor discussed among "polite company." I knew nothing of lynchings in Roanoke in the 1800s and 1900s, nor that the city's prominent leaders were founders of the KKK. As a child, I was aware that Burrell Hospital was for black people, but I had no idea it was named after a black physician who died because hospitals which served whites only refused to admit him for treatment. Although appalled by what I read, being familiar with the place names and family names from a city where I formerly lived made the book mandatory reading for me. Harriet Muse, mother of the albino brothers, is the heroine of this book. Ahead of her time, she was a maid and laundress who stood up to the white bureaucracy and the circuses that had not paid the brothers for their forced performances.How ironic that I read this book over the weekend of the very last performance of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. Somehow I felt a little less nostalgic. A high compliment I can pay to "Truevine" is that I now want to read Mrs. Macy's other well-known book, "Factory Man."

Not much attention was paid to the subjects of this book--Willie and George Muse, but the descriptions of what life was like for African Americans in the early and mid-twentieth century are exceptionally good and make the book well worth reading. The research was detailed and difficult since the author had to learn about the Muse brothers mostly from newspapers and interviews with their relatives and acquaintances. I wanted to know more about how Willie and George viewed their situation, but I know they left no written records of their feelings and thoughts.

The beauty and the importance of this book during a time of such American unrest cannot be overstated. People will say that it's the level of accuracy that went into weaving such a complicated story together is what makes the book so good--and that part of it is impressive--but what really makes this book so readable and compelling is the author's empathy toward her subject. Walt Whitman said somewhere that there are are no qualities in writers that won't come out in their writing, and, boy, it's true. This book has been imagined and understood and written out of a sincere concern and love for others. It has been imagined and understood and written out of Macy's need to correct the fear and silence that generates and supports all injustice. Plus Macy can write! I think TRUEVINE should be read by every American. And quick.

Gave to my son family history written in a good

This is a good book, but I have not yet been able to get through it all. There is just too much detail about the circus itself, and other topics unrelated to the plight of the two brothers and their mother, or of the general misery of American Negros in the South, and in the Roanoke area in particular.I was impressed by the amount of research that went into the book, but ultimately, the details were just too numerous.

Not for me

I havent finished it yet but what a heart breaking story...

This is a haunting and engrossing read. Incredibly moving.Recommend reading for anyone who seeks to further understand the Jim Crow south through the lens of a wrenching family story, well researched.Racism and human slavery endure today and I think it's not too much of a stretch to say that this book helps us understand our present as much as our past.

Very interesting. A bit less a story, more a history of the attitudes of the time....

Quick delivery. I’m still reading the book.