LibGuides: Just Mercy: A Story of Justice & Redemption: Welcome

Use this guide to find and evaluate information and resources related to social justice.

This guide grew out of a book discussion group sponsored by the Honors Program and the David L. Underwood Library at the Florissant Valley Campus of St. Louis Community College.

Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption

Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
Call Number: 353.48 S8472j FV-Stacks, MC-Stacks
Publication Date: 2014
A powerful true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix our broken system of justice--from one of the most brilliant and influential lawyers of our time.

Awards:

New York Times Bestseller | Named one of the Best Books of the Year by The New York Times • The Washington Post • The Boston Globe • The Seattle Times • Esquire • Time

Winner of the Carnegie Medal for Nonfiction | Winner of the NAACP Image Award for Nonfiction | Winner of a Books for a Better Life Award | Finalist for the Los Angeles Book Prize | Finalist for the Kirkus Reviews Prize | An American Library Association Notable Book. Read more about Just Mercy from the Equal Justice Initiative (EIJ) web site.

"The true measure of our character....

Random House describes Just Mercy as:

A powerful true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix our broken system of justice — from one of the most brilliant and influential lawyers of our time.

Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a legal practice dedicated to defending those most desperate and in need: the poor, the wrongly condemned, and women and children trapped in the farthest reaches of our criminal justice system. One of his first cases was that of Walter McMillian, a young man who was sentenced to die for a notorious murder he insisted he didn’t commit. The case drew Bryan into a tangle of conspiracy, political machinations, and legal brinksmanship—and transformed his understanding of mercy and justice forever.

Just Mercy is at once an unforgettable account of an idealistic, gifted young lawyer’s coming of age, a moving window into the lives of those he has defended, and an inspiring argument for compassion in the pursuit of justice.

Related Books Available at STLCC Libraries

The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Call Number: 364.973 A374n (FV-Stacks, M-Stacks, FP)
ISBN: 9781595581037
Publication Date: 2010-01-05
Despite the triumphant dismantling of the Jim Crow Laws, the system that once forced African Americans into a segregated second-class citizenship still haunts America, the US criminal justice system still unfairly targets black men and an entire segment of the population is deprived of their basic rights. Outside of prisons, a web of laws and regulations discriminates against these wrongly convicted ex-offenders in voting, housing, employment and education. Alexander here offers an urgent call for justice.
Children of the Prison Boom by Sara Wakefield; Christopher Wildeman
Call Number: 362.829 W147c (FV-Stacks)
ISBN: 9780199989225
Publication Date: 2013-12-05
Drawing upon broadly representative survey data and qualitative interviews, Children of the Prison Boom describes the devastating effects of America's experiment in mass incarceration for a generation of vulnerable children. Parental imprisonment has transformed from an event affecting only the unluckiest of children - children of parents whose involvement in crime would have been quite serious - to one that is remarkably common, especially for black children.

Fiction:

A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines
Call Number: F G141L (FV, FP & MC owns)
ISBN: 9780375702709
A Lesson Before Dying, is set in a small Cajun community in the late 1940s. Jefferson, a young black man, is an unwitting party to a liquor store shoot out in which three men are killed; the only survivor, he is convicted of murder and sentenced to death. Grant Wiggins, who left his hometown for the university, has returned to the plantation school to teach. As he struggles with his decision whether to stay or escape to another state, his aunt and Jefferson's godmother persuade him to visit Jefferson in his cell and impart his learning and his pride to Jefferson before his death. In the end, the two men forge a bond as they both come to understand the simple heroism of resisting--and defying--the expected. Ernest J. Gaines brings to this novel the same rich sense of place, the same deep understanding of the human psyche, and the same compassion for a people and their struggle that have informed his previous, highly praised works of fiction.
Mass Incarceration on Trial: A Remarkable Court Decision and the Future of Prisons in America by Jonathan Simon
Call Number: 344.035 S5953m FV-Stacks
Publication Date: 2014
"For nearly forty years the United States has been gripped by policies that have placed more than 2.5 million Americans in jails and prisons designed to hold a fraction of that number of inmates. Our prisons are not only vast and overcrowded, they are degrading- relying on racist gangs, lockdowns, and Supermax-style segregation units to maintain a tenuous order. Mass Incarceration on Trial examines a series of landmark decisions about prison conditions- culminating in Brown v. Plata, decided in May 2011 by the U.S. Supreme Court- that has opened an unexpected escape route from this trap of "tough on crime" politics.
The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row by Anthony Ray Hinton, with Lara Love Hardin ; and a foreword by Bryan Stevenson (2018)
Call Number: 364.66 H6662s FV-Stacks
"A powerful, revealing story of hope, love, justice, and the power of reading by a man who spent thirty years on death row for a crime he didn't commit. In 1985, Anthony Ray Hinton was arrested and charged with two counts of capital murder in Alabama. Stunned, confused, and only twenty–nine years old, Hinton knew that it was a case of mistaken identity and believed that the truth would prove his innocence and ultimately set him free...With the help of civil rights attorney and bestselling author of Just Mercy, Bryan Stevenson, Hinton won his release in 2015. With a foreword by Stevenson, The Sun Does Shine is an extraordinary testament to the power of hope sustained through the darkest times. Destined to be a classic memoir of wrongful imprisonment and freedom won, Hinton’s memoir tells his dramatic thirty–year journey and shows how you can take away a man's freedom, but you can't take away his imagination, humor, or joy." (Publisher)

STLCC Library Catalog: Related Resources

Select subject headings below to view other resources available in the STLCC Libraries Catalog:

Equal Justice Initiative

Bryan Stevenson, author of Just Mercy, is the executive director and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI). The work of the EJI focuses on these areas:

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Just Mercy: A Story of Justice & Redemption

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