A spare, poetic text introduces the Civil Rights Movement through a few experiences in the life of Coretta Scott (King). The narrative opens with young Coretta walking through the dark five miles to a colored school. When a school bus full of white children passes by, Coretta and her siblings are covered in dust, “but / songs and birds of all colors / and rich soil / where slaves fought freedom / steadied them / in the face of danger.” With a turn of the page Coretta has grown to a young woman certain “that the good Lord intended freedom / for the Negro.” She meets and marries Martin Luther King Jr. and joins the organized struggle of African Americans across the south and across the country for Civil Rights, “singin’, always singin’.” Artist Kadir Nelson’s stirring pictures feature almost life-size faces rich with emotions, as well iconographic scenes of the Civil Rights Movement in a book that provides most of its biographical details in a one-page endnote. (Ages 6–9)

Walking many miles to school in the dusty road, young Coretta knew, too well, the unfairness of life in the segregated south.

A yearning for equality began to grow.

Together with Martin Luther King, Jr., she gave birth to a vision and a journey—with dreams of freedom for all.

This extraordinary union of poetic text by Ntozake Shange and monumental artwork by Kadir Nelson captures the movement for civil rights in the United States and honors its most elegant inspiration, Coretta Scott.