James Baquet “Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry” tells the trials and triumphs of the Logans, a Black family in the American South in 1933. We see the problems brought on by farming as well as the societal conditions of living in the white-dominated society of the South. Nine-year-old Cassie Logan lives with her mother (a schoolteacher) and paternal grandmother (“Big Ma”) as well as her three brothers: Stacey, Christopher-John and Little Man, ages 12, 7, and 6 respectively. Their father is away during part of the story, working on the railroad to help with the family’s expenses; he brings a friend, Mr. Morrison, to live on the family property to help protect them. The book includes several story lines. In one, Little Man is incensed that the books the children are given were discards from the local white school. He finds this injustice intolerable; their mother pastes paper over the sign-in from previous years to make it seem the books are “new.” In another, the children sabotage the road, causing an accident by the white children’s school bus. This has been a source of daily mockery when the bus passes the children, throwing mud on them to the jeers of the white students. In yet another, Cassie “befriends” a cruel white girl, Lillian Jean Simms, so Lillian Jean will tell Cassie her secrets — whom she loves, etc. With this information, Cassie blackmails the white girl, who must thereafter treat her kindly. Things get more serious as a boy in the school is caught cheating, and lies to get “Mama” fired. Meanwhile Mama and Daddy have created a kind of shoppers’ cooperative to avoid supporting the local white-owned store. This leads to violence against the family by the white community. Near the end of the story, the bank calls the loan on the Logans’ farm, forcing their uncle to sell his prized car to come up with the payments on short notice. At long last a fragile peace is established when the community comes together to put out a fire that could destroy the local forest — a fire set by Daddy to bring people together in a common emergency. Here the book ends, but the author, Mildred D. Taylor, wrote four sequels and three prequels, known together as the “Logan Family Saga.” Vocabulary: Which word above means: 1. victories, wins 2. extremely angry 3. a long, heroic story 4. break something on purpose 5. controlled by white people 6. things thrown away 7. of the father’s side 8. easily broken 9. rude remarks 10. an economic association | 