{"product_id":"carry-the-rock-race-football-and-the-soul-of-an-american-city-9781682262269","title":"Carry the Rock: Race, Football, and the Soul of","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn 2007, as the fiftieth anniversary of the fight to integrate Little Rock Central High School approached, veteran sportswriter and native son of Little Rock Jay Jennings returned to his hometown to take the pulse of the city and the school. He found a compelling story in Central High's football team, where Black and white students toiled under longtime coach Bernie Cox, whose philosophy of discipline and responsibility and punishing brand of physical football had led the team to win seven state championships.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eCarry the Rock\u003c\/i\u003e tells the story of the dramatic ups and downs of a high school football season and reveals a city struggling with its legacy of racial discrimination and the complex issues of contemporary segregation. In the season Jennings masterfully chronicles, Cox finds his ideas sorely tested in his attempts to unify the team, and the result is an account brimming with humor, compassion, frustration, and honesty. What \u003ci\u003eFriday Night Lights\u003c\/i\u003e did for small-town Texas, \u003ci\u003eCarry the Rock\u003c\/i\u003e does for the urban South and for any place like Little Rock where sports, race, and community intersect.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Jennings writes…with authority and power.”—Howard Bryant, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eCarry the Rock\u003c\/i\u003e transcends the season-on-the-brink genre.” —Eddie Dean, \u003ci\u003eWall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e “We’re just a page or two into the prologue when we realize we’re in the hands of a discerning and expert storyteller. The sweeping opening gives way to a multi-tiered narrative that isn’t just great sportswriting, but chronicles the history of a team, a school and a city that, 50 years later, is still trying to come to terms with its most harrowing and\/or calcifying event. This is not an undemanding story about a football team; it’s a rich portrait of a complicated place and its people.”—\u003ci\u003eArkansas Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A native son juxtaposes passion for football and the tumultuous history of race relations in Little Rock. The result is a must-read page-turner.”—Minnijean Brown Trickey, Little Rock Nine member\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A sweeping yet nuanced portrait of race in America— a picture of how far we have come since the Little Rock Nine made their historic stand and of how far we still have to go.”—Jonathan Mahler, author of \u003ci\u003eLadies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jennings has produced that rarest of things: A book about race and sports that avoids all the usual clichÉs. Unsentimental yet inspiring, \u003ci\u003eCarry the Rock\u003c\/i\u003e does what all books about race relations should attempt but few achieve. It tells the reader something he doesn’t know.”—Joe Queenan, author of \u003ci\u003eTrue Believers: The Tragic Inner Life of Sports Fans\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eClosing Time: A Memoir\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of Arkansas Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50469786976599,"sku":"9781682262269","price":21.56,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781682262269.jpg?v=1744896302","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/carry-the-rock-race-football-and-the-soul-of-an-american-city-9781682262269","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}