A brutal, moving memoir . Anyone who emerges from America s black working-class youth with words as fine as Ward s deserves a hearing - Guardian Raw, beautiful and dangerous - New York Times Book Review Lavishly endowed with literary craft and hard-earned wisdom - Time_______________The beautiful, haunting memoir from Jesmyn Ward, the first woman to win the National Book Award twice And then we heard the rain falling and that was the blood falling; and when we came to get in the crops, it was dead men that we reaped - Harriet Tubman