Standing Against Hate by Mary Cronk Farrell - ADVISABLE

Standing Against Hate: How Black Women in the Army Helped Change the Course of WWII by Mary Cronk Farrell, 196 pages.  NON-FICTION  Abrams Books, 2019.  $18.  

Content: Language: PG (1 swear); Mature Content: G; Violence: PG-13.  

BUYING ADVISORY: MS, HS – ADVISABLE  

AUDIENCE APPEAL: AVERAGE  

This non-fiction book concentrates on the African American women who joined the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) during World War II.  Similar to the prejudice and discrimination that African American men suffered, the women in this book enlisted to help the United States win the war against oppression from Hitler but suffered from the oppression in their own country. Charity Adams was one of the main people highlighted throughout the book and she led her battalion as they sorted packages in England that were backlogged and not reaching the troops.  Adams ran a tight system that enabled troops to receive their mail and showed the Army that African American women were as capable as the rest of the Army.  

I loved the women in this book, and they were courageous and unstoppable.  It’s not easy to read about the poor treatment and discrimination suffered by African American women and the violence includes police brutality.  There are historical photographs which make the story easy to visualize.  This is a great perspective to add to your Black History or World War II collections.  

Reviewer, C. Peterson