Roots

I'm so glad I ordered the paperback version.

Knowing that any book version verses the movie is always better and has more details, "Roots" by Alex Haley is no different. I have the mini series on DVD which I'm glad I viewed before reading the book. The movie is a water down version to the book. The book is more like a review of slavery during the Civil War with much more details that were not in the movie. Remember the movie was edited for television. Before purchasing the book, I wanted to know a little bit more about Alex Haley and one of the things that caught my attention was that he was x-military U.S. Coast Guard. Also, I wanted to know why it took him 12 years to the research for the book. I learned not only was he researching his ancestors but he was learning about their surrounding day to day life (culture). With that said "Roots" is more like a history book that covers the life and culture of Africa during the 1700's, how husbands were able to speak a language that their wives were not allowed to speak or learn, or how there were many antislavery societies such as the Christians, Methodist and Quakers just to name a few. There is so much more in the book I found refreshing to learn of how our country was develop during the cotton gin age. There is so much more to the Civil War or the other wars within the United States that was or is not mentioned in our mainstream history books. A must read for all students sixth grade and up. Read more