Book cover of She's Such A Bright Girl: An American Story

Book description

"She's Such A Bright Girl: An American Story" is a story of respectability politics gone very wrong. Petula Caesar is raised in the 1970s and 1980s in Paterson, New Jersey and Baltimore, Maryland. Petula's Black parents, dark-brown skinned Christine and a very light-skinned Walter – migrate north from the south…

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Why read it?

1 author picked She's Such A Bright Girl as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

In this memoir, Petula talks about the light-skin privilege and pain she suffered through growing up in the 70s and 80s in Paterson, New Jersey and Baltimore, Maryland with a dark-skinned mother and a light-skinned father. Her father, Walter, raised her to be as “White” as possible by neglecting her Black heritage which caused her to have a huge identity crisis.

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On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

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