Books

Books by Joseph Howell

You are invited to read two books by Joseph Howell.

The first is Hard Living on Clay Street,  published by Doubleday in 1973 and still in print today (Waveland Press). The book is about the day-in, day-out lives of white, working class families trying to survive. The third edition came out about a year ago with a new Introduction and Epilogue and an endorsement on the cover by Joan C. Williams, “If you want to understand why Trump got elected, read this book.” The book is available on Amazon.com.

The second book is Civil Rights Journey, an Authorhouse book published in 2011 and currently promoted by Book Whirl. The description of that book is below:

A White Southerner’s Life During the Civil Rights Movement

Author shares his personal journey as a young white man at the rise of black power in rural Georgia 

Washington, DC – Coming from the success of his best-selling book, Hard Living on Clay Street: Portraits of Blue Collar Families, author Joseph Howell is back with another stirring read as he offers an eye-opening account of struggling and battling against social injustice, with his rare view of the civil rights movement through a white man’s eyes. In Civil Rights Journey: The Story of a White Southerner Coming of Age during the Civil Rights Revolution, Howell provides a different story, unlike other books and memoirs of the civil rights movement, with his own version of how a young white man is shaped by the crucibles of polio and segregation and later by that of the civil rights movement. 

The author has written a remarkable memoir in his honest and raw depiction of the effects of human vulnerability and of human cruelty. He takes everyone on a journey to rural Georgia at the height of the civil rights movement and the rise of black power. This is his personal account of his struggles to work with black activists to make change in communities deeply marred by entrenched issues of racism and social injustice. In his honest narrative, readers will understand the vital role that white people played in racial justice movements and the complex terrain they entered as they struggled to build new kinds of relationships with black activists and with “regular folks.” 

“Civil Rights Journey offers the reader a multilayered account of a young man born in the pre–civil rights South, sheltered by a code of customs that privileged the white middle class at the expense of blacks and poor whites, and of his formation and moral development shaped by his civil rights journey.” – Mark R. Warren, Harvard University, author of Fire in the Heart: How White Activists Embrace Racial Justice

“A quietly inspiring civil rights memoir by a white southerner… A nuanced, passionate reminder that civil liberty is a work in progress.” – Kirkus Review

This book is available online and can be purchased at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com.  

About the Author
Joseph Howell is also the author of “Hard Living on Clay Street: Portraits of Blue Collar Families”, a book in continuous print since 1973. He has been a consultant in the development of affordable and seniors housing and taught at the George Washington University and the University of Maryland. He lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Embry, a health policy researcher at the Urban Institute. They have two grown children and four grandchildren.

Civil Rights Journey: The Story of a White Southerner Coming of Age during the Civil Rights Revolution
by Joseph Howell  
Publication Date: April 2011
Paperback $14.49; 200 pages; ISBN 9781456762087
To request a complimentary paperback review copy, you may contact BookWhirl.com by phone at (877) 207-1679 or by email at info@bookwhirl.com