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booksandbraids's review against another edition
3.0
This book was selected as the June 2021 selection for a book club I am joining. I should have read this book while I was still living in Mississippi so that I could have gone to Natchez and appreciated this interesting town! On our way to/from New Orleans, we stopped and went to Longwood, but we did not even drive by the other great homes. If I was still living in MS I would definitely make a trip for pilgrimage.
rtwilliams16's review against another edition
4.0
Natchez, Mississippi is a very eccentric and quirky city in the southwest portion of the state. It has been described as being a little version of New Orleans, Louisiana and less like the rest of Mississippi. It has an interesting history, one in which it was Pro-Union during the Civil War even when Mississippi seceded but still promoted the institution of slavery. The citizens of Natchez consist of liberals and conservatives and their current mayor is a Black gay man who received 91% of the vote. This all may seem like progress to the naked eye but Natchez continues to promote a view of the past that they just can’t seem to let go and it mostly revolves around their romanticized view of the old antebellum South. Richard Grant’s forthcoming book The Deepest South of All: True Stories from Natchez, Mississippi covers the complicated history and recent events of this Mississippi town.
Grant’s book alternates between current day Natchez and a story about an African prince named Abdulrahman Ibrahima, who was enslaved in the town. The modern accounts focus on the mostly white traditions that venerate the Old South through its garden clubs, banquets, historical tours, and the Tableaux play. All of these festivities promoted a Lost Cause/Pro-Confederate view of the South which seldom mentioned slavery and when it did it promoted the false narrative that slaves were happy and slavery wasn’t so bad. The story of Ibrahima, on the other hand, is a fascinating biography of a prince and his never ending fight for freedom.
Grant introduces the reader to unforgettable characters such as Ser Boxley (pictured on the left of the book cover), a Black activist who advocates for the true history of slavery to be told in Natchez and Greg Iles, the white bestselling author who consults with Natchez elites to put more slavery stories into the plays and other festivities. Both individuals face resistance from older white Natchez citizens as well as tourists, who don’t want to hear anything about slavery because it makes them upset, they just want to see the nice old houses. These same resistors vent against what they see as political correctness run amok. This part of the book reminded me so much of our current debate on Confederate statutes and how supporters say its erasing history, albeit a false one.
Grant is an amazing storyteller. He writes about Nellie Jackson, a Black woman who owned a brothel for 60 years in Natchez. Everyone in town including law enforcement knew about it and was ok with it. However, it was her more activist role in the civil rights movement that fascinated me. Grant also chronicles the open interracial relationships that occurred in the 19th Century and the current day white and black descendants of those relationships who acknowledge each other as family. The more I read this book the more I came away with how strange this town was and is. I could not get enough of it.
The book ends with Natchez remaining a very complicated city. Small progress has been made on some fronts while other efforts on progress are rolled back, as is life. Overall, The Deepest South of All is an amazing book that has led me on a path to learning more about Natchez especially its Black history. It has introduced me to several films, such as Prince Among Slaves, Mississippi Madam: The Life of Nellie Jackson, and Black Natchez, that I will be checking out in the near future. If you love learning about the South and its history then you will enjoy reading about this unusual city.
Thanks to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster, and Richard Grant for a free ARC copy in exchange for an honest review. The Deepest South of All will be released on September 1, 2020.
My review was first published on my blog Ballasts for the Mind: https://medium.com/ballasts-for-the-mind/review-the-deepest-south-of-all-true-stories-from-natchez-mississippi-by-richard-grant-9d6d1626c88a
Grant’s book alternates between current day Natchez and a story about an African prince named Abdulrahman Ibrahima, who was enslaved in the town. The modern accounts focus on the mostly white traditions that venerate the Old South through its garden clubs, banquets, historical tours, and the Tableaux play. All of these festivities promoted a Lost Cause/Pro-Confederate view of the South which seldom mentioned slavery and when it did it promoted the false narrative that slaves were happy and slavery wasn’t so bad. The story of Ibrahima, on the other hand, is a fascinating biography of a prince and his never ending fight for freedom.
Grant introduces the reader to unforgettable characters such as Ser Boxley (pictured on the left of the book cover), a Black activist who advocates for the true history of slavery to be told in Natchez and Greg Iles, the white bestselling author who consults with Natchez elites to put more slavery stories into the plays and other festivities. Both individuals face resistance from older white Natchez citizens as well as tourists, who don’t want to hear anything about slavery because it makes them upset, they just want to see the nice old houses. These same resistors vent against what they see as political correctness run amok. This part of the book reminded me so much of our current debate on Confederate statutes and how supporters say its erasing history, albeit a false one.
Grant is an amazing storyteller. He writes about Nellie Jackson, a Black woman who owned a brothel for 60 years in Natchez. Everyone in town including law enforcement knew about it and was ok with it. However, it was her more activist role in the civil rights movement that fascinated me. Grant also chronicles the open interracial relationships that occurred in the 19th Century and the current day white and black descendants of those relationships who acknowledge each other as family. The more I read this book the more I came away with how strange this town was and is. I could not get enough of it.
The book ends with Natchez remaining a very complicated city. Small progress has been made on some fronts while other efforts on progress are rolled back, as is life. Overall, The Deepest South of All is an amazing book that has led me on a path to learning more about Natchez especially its Black history. It has introduced me to several films, such as Prince Among Slaves, Mississippi Madam: The Life of Nellie Jackson, and Black Natchez, that I will be checking out in the near future. If you love learning about the South and its history then you will enjoy reading about this unusual city.
Thanks to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster, and Richard Grant for a free ARC copy in exchange for an honest review. The Deepest South of All will be released on September 1, 2020.
My review was first published on my blog Ballasts for the Mind: https://medium.com/ballasts-for-the-mind/review-the-deepest-south-of-all-true-stories-from-natchez-mississippi-by-richard-grant-9d6d1626c88a
jodiguerra's review against another edition
5.0
Richard Grant is a British journalist and author fascinated by the ironies of Natchez, MS. He is friends with Regina Charboneau, a Natchez socialite, cookbook author, and business woman. While visiting her, he begins a quest to understand this full-of-contradictions Southern town.
As noted in the book jacket, Natchez “once ad more millionaires per capita than anywhere in America, and its wealth was built on cotton and slavery.” The social scene for white citizens swirls around fundraising to keep up the many antebellum plantation mansions in what is likely the only matriarchy in the US. The black citizenry sometimes rails, sometimes participates, in these spectacles. Natchez faces financial battles and upheaval as it tries to cope with its past and somehow work together to build a better future.
This book, even before I received it, interested me because I already knew Natchez was a close cousin to that other distinctly weird and wild Southern city, Savannah. I know this because my mother was born in Natchez, and Mississippi is always a place full of contradictions. As Grant notes, it has produced per capita “more great writers and musicians...than any other state in America -- and in blown psychological gaskets and erratic behavior.” And while John Berendt had a murder in a mansion in Savannah to anchor his story “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” (a must read!), Grant has his own completely off the wall cast of characters including elderly women in hoop skirts, the only police chauffeured drunk-driving escapade of Santa Clauses that I’m aware of, haunted houses, visits to cemeteries, gay mayors, frustrated activists, and feuding garden clubs.
Grant weaves the story of Prince Ibrahim, a royal son of Africa, who finds himself enslaved and working on a plantation in Natchez. His tale is the haunting backdrop to the current state of affairs Grant also explores.
While reminiscent of “Confederates in the Attic,” this book is more direct but just as fun. If you like Southern history or travel tales, you will like this book!
As noted in the book jacket, Natchez “once ad more millionaires per capita than anywhere in America, and its wealth was built on cotton and slavery.” The social scene for white citizens swirls around fundraising to keep up the many antebellum plantation mansions in what is likely the only matriarchy in the US. The black citizenry sometimes rails, sometimes participates, in these spectacles. Natchez faces financial battles and upheaval as it tries to cope with its past and somehow work together to build a better future.
This book, even before I received it, interested me because I already knew Natchez was a close cousin to that other distinctly weird and wild Southern city, Savannah. I know this because my mother was born in Natchez, and Mississippi is always a place full of contradictions. As Grant notes, it has produced per capita “more great writers and musicians...than any other state in America -- and in blown psychological gaskets and erratic behavior.” And while John Berendt had a murder in a mansion in Savannah to anchor his story “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” (a must read!), Grant has his own completely off the wall cast of characters including elderly women in hoop skirts, the only police chauffeured drunk-driving escapade of Santa Clauses that I’m aware of, haunted houses, visits to cemeteries, gay mayors, frustrated activists, and feuding garden clubs.
Grant weaves the story of Prince Ibrahim, a royal son of Africa, who finds himself enslaved and working on a plantation in Natchez. His tale is the haunting backdrop to the current state of affairs Grant also explores.
While reminiscent of “Confederates in the Attic,” this book is more direct but just as fun. If you like Southern history or travel tales, you will like this book!
alsmilesalot's review against another edition
I have just so enjoyed Grant’s writing (this and ‘Dispatches’ thus far). What a great storyteller! He is compassionate about a very challenging (and eccentric) place and clearly genuinely interested in understanding it, not just reporting the ‘juicy bits’ (of which there are plenty).
Learned a lot about my home state and about Natchez (which I think I’ve only ever been to once—my loss!)
I especially loved the structure of this book with the alternating story-/time-lines!
Learned a lot about my home state and about Natchez (which I think I’ve only ever been to once—my loss!)
I especially loved the structure of this book with the alternating story-/time-lines!
greyt_things's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
fast-paced
5.0