NEGROLAND A Memoir

Robin Miles narrates this insightful memoir, which traces the history of the black elite in America. What was it like growing up a light-skinned "Negro" who was part of the black aristocracy? Margo Jefferson, daughter of a pediatrician father and socialite mother, describes how educated upper-class light-skinned blacks have lived among whites from the Colonial period through the present. Miles's narration grows more emotional when the memoir describes Jefferson's youth in 1950s and '60s Chicago. All in all, Miles delivers a fascinating view of black class structure, attitudes on color, civil rights, feminism, privilege, and the fight for equality in white and black society. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine [Published: DECEMBER 2015]