New Book Explores the Role of Journalism in the Civil-Rights Era South

Found in Pieces (Barn Loft Press), is now available in hardcover, paperback, and digital formats from Amazon and other major book outlets. Contact: Barn Loft Press, [email protected]

Rochester, United States - September 10, 2020 /PressCable/ —

PITTSFORD, New York—How can tension between business considerations and editorial policy in journalism during the Civil Rights Era in the South help us understand the role of media in today’s political and social climate? Released shortly before Labor Day, the new book, Found in Pieces, a novel by George Rollie Adams, PhD, historian, former president and CEO of The Strong National Museum of Play, explores what happens when public perceptions and expectations, economic pressures, and personal beliefs about morality, fairness, and justice clash in a small southern town in 1958. (Adams, author, coauthor, and coeditor of nonfiction books on American history, grew up in southern Arkansas during this period, and his first novel, South of Little Rock, received four independent publishing awards for regional and social issues fiction.)

“Found in Pieces is a captivating story and a must-read for anyone interested in American history and how it informs our lives today,” says Gretchen Sorin, historian and author of Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights, which is the basis for an upcoming PBS documentary by Ken Burns. With “characters you care about and experiences that tug at your heart,” says Sorin, Found in Pieces “raises questions about the importance of a free press, the meaning of democracy, and the ultimate fate of American racism.”

Set in fictional Unionville, Arkansas, Found in Pieces unfolds during the second year of turmoil over Governor Orval Faubus’s determination to stop the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School. At a time when almost no women own and edit newspapers, Pearl Goodbar risks her family’s financial future to buy a defunct weekly. Before she can get the paper up and running, her husband loses his job, Faubus initiates a new crisis in the state capital, and the adult son of black businesswoman Sadie Rose Washington disappears. The mystery of his whereabouts brings the two women—one white and one black but both of them mothers—together and leaves Pearl facing business decisions that could lead to more money woes and even physical harm to herself and those close to her. Meanwhile, a prominent white man hides a dark secret that Sadie Rose knows but will not tell.

“I am grateful for this book,” says James Whorton, Jr. of the College at Brockport and author of Frankland, Approximately Heaven, and other works of fiction. “Once upon a time, respectable people thought that races should be kept apart. Insane but true, and Found In Pieces does the work of remembering how natural and easy it is not to see the wrong in front of you. There are always a dozen reasons to overlook injustice. George Rollie Adams dramatizes the problem in a vivid, suspenseful, and violent story that I did not want to put down.”

Says Adams, “Growing up in Arkansas and later teaching there, I saw and heard firsthand the arguments for and against social change, and I saw how the coming of it heightened tensions between the races and among white citizens who held diverging views. But I also saw ways in which social change brought people together, and how it caused some to see in new ways. Also, as a youngster, I had opportunity to see inside a small local newspaper, and later I was privileged to do historical research in many newspapers from various eras and sections of the country. I used all of that and numerous works of history to inform the novel.

Found in Pieces, published by Barn Loft Press, is available in hardcover, paperback, and digital formats from Amazon and other major book outlets. Review copies are available upon request. The book’s ISBN numbers are as follows. Hard cover: 978-7333669-5-3. Paperback: 978-1-7333669-4-6. Ebook: 978-1-7333669-3-9. For more information, visit https://georgerollieadamsbooks.com.

About George Rollie Adams

Adams is an educator, historian, author, and museum professional. As president and CEO of The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, from 1987 through 2016, Adams led the development of the world’s first collections-based history museum devoted solely to the study of play and its critical role in learning and human development and the ways in which play illuminates cultural history. Adams grew up in southern Arkansas, received a bachelor’s degree in social science education and English from Louisiana Tech University, and taught history for four years at El Dorado, Arkansas, High School while also earning a master’s degree in education from Louisiana Tech. He holds a doctorate in American history from the University of Arizona and is the founding editor in chief of the American Journal of Play; author of General William S. Harney: Prince of Dragoons, a finalist for the Army Historical Foundation’s Distinguished Book Award; and author of South of Little Rock, recipient of four independent publishing awards for regional and social issues fiction.

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Source: PressCable

Release ID: 88975431