Isabel Wilkerson!

There she is...from a slightly blurry distance.

Tonight, I saw Isabel Wilkerson, author of The Warmth of Other Suns, give a lecture at the University of Memphis. This was neat for me because a lot of the authors of my favorite books are dead (Edith Wharton, for example), and it was nice actually seeing someone in person whose book I adored. She is an amazing speaker (I got a little teary) and hearing her talk reminded me of how phenomenal The Warmth of Other Suns is. She spoke of how the Great Migration was a "leaderless revolution"--the migrators decided within themselves to take a leap of faith and step into an unknown world for the chance at something better. She said that each of us has a similar power within us to create change. I sincerely hope that in the midst of this book tour, she is either working on or thinking about her next book.

P.S. If you haven't read  The Warmth of Other Suns, do it do it do it now!