Would love to see if these two topics successfully merge in this essay. Thanks!

 I travelled to Mississippi for the first time recently and found myself ensconced in the Victorian home of a beloved friend who had retired to her hometown about a decade earlier. Her house stood proudly atop a rolling green lawn punctuated by pale pink azaleas and the barking, jumping, and nipping of two large juvenile rescue hounds.

The exterior of my friend’s place had a perfect wraparound porch. The interior boasted 16-foot ceilings, six fireplaces with colorful ceramic surrounds, and lovely antiques, carpets and paintings. The large country kitchen was the heart of the house, and the two dogs, William and Percy, lounged comfortably within its limits when not outside chasing bees, cars, humans, and any other moving creatures.

During my visit, my friend and her loved ones lavished me with Southern hospitality: croquet and dinner parties, supper clubs, meals at historic inns. I met former high school rodeo stars, real life cowboys, special needs children, and a sweet man teetering on the brink of memory loss.

Cattle and horses grazed in pastures bathed in late afternoon light. Green hills rolled alongside country roads. Antebellum houses hid in small lanes. Wild dogs roamed the cemetery and raced out near the town hall, if you ventured too close with one of your own on a leash.

Like many small towns in America, the commercial center in my friend’s hometown was somewhat decimated, most buildings vacant due to a combination of white flight, box stores, online commerce, and the pandemic. The main street was now anchored by the post office, a hair products emporium, the town newspaper’s office, a bank, and the library. All else were skeletal remains.

I kind of fell in love with the place.

At my friend’s house, a jigsaw puzzle table occupied a well-lit corner of the spacious dining room. In the adjacent living room, two couches stretched out, begging to be read in.

The day after I arrived, my friend handed me a first edition copy of Angie Thomas's young adult novel Concrete Rose. Normally I do not read much YA fiction, but the South is a place of good manners, so that evening, rather than choosing my own book, I flipped to page one and got started.

I am so glad I did.

The setting for this novel is sixty miles away from where I visited. The action takes place in Garden Heights, a fictionalized version of the Georgetown section of Jackson, Mississippi, the state capitol. The world that Angie Thomas creates in Concrete Rose bears little resemblance to the Mississippi I experienced. Although there are tight knit families and deep friendships, there are are no supper clubs in this book.

Concrete Rose tells the story of 17-year old Maverick, a high school student and gang member whose hard-working mother does not know he is dealing drugs to help her pay bills while his father, an original OG, "old gangsta," does 40 years in prison on drug charges. Maverick, known to his friends as "Li'l Don," lives in a world of basketball, teenage love, and gang tensions. 

When Maverick's best friend, a young father eagerly anticipating his upcoming marriage, is gunned down, Maverick's world falls apart. Just 17, he has lost his father and Dre, the closest he has to a brother. Bent on revenge for Dre's murder, Maverick also finds himself to be an unexpected father, and not by the girl he loves. When his infant son's mother disappears, the baby becomes Maverick’s responsibility. Maverick learns to change diapers, warm bottles, and coax his baby to sleep, all while going to school.

Given his new role, Maverick can no longer hang out or even do well in school. He struggles to be responsible, to give up dealing, and to earn an honest living in a world without much opportunity for young black men. At the same time, Maverick struggles to win back his girlfriend, who attends parochial school and is determined to go to college the following year.

This novel took me into a world I've never spent time in and did what great storytelling does. It taught me about people I am likely to never know yet whose experience of the world is important for me to try to understand. I fell hard for Maverick. I suspect most readers will.

Author Angie Thomas grew up in Jackson, Mississippi, and Concrete Rose is a prequel to her debut novel The Hate You Give, a New York Times number one bestseller and the basis for the 2018 film of the same name. During the Black Lives Matter protests in Jackson last summer, Thomas, who was featured in a Time Magazine article, emphasized the power of books to inspire the next generation of leaders.

Actually, books can inspire all of us.

Thank you, Mississippi.