Red Dirt, Blue Blood -- Book Review

Red Dirt, Blue Blood, The Story of the Nances of Lower Alabama (Rahkia Nance, 2020) is exactly that, a human-interest story of a family, descended from slaves, who at one time settled in the area that is now Fort Rucker, and surrounding counties. In this book are many interesting stories of young mayors, philanthropists, teachers, farmers, soldiers, and mill and factory workers. 

This book isn't about racism, and there are very few mentions of racism in the book. This book was interesting to me since my family came from a near-by part of the state, and because some of the Nance's have stuff named after them in my hometown of Union Springs.

Red Dirt is a quick read, only containing about 60 pages of text and another 50 pages of interesting photos. Unfortunately, some of the photos aren't clear.

In many ways, Red Dirt, Blue Blood is much like Poppa Didn't Play That, by Mildred Burrell (2020).

Poppa Didn't Play That is a quick and delightful read. There are only a few mentions of racism and discrimination in this book. The book isn't about that. This book is about one particular family. It's about their family life. It's a human-interest story. I was glad to read this after reading Dispossession; I needed something lighter.