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2026 Reading Challenge
James McBride
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James McBride

Goodreads Author


Born
in Red Hook, Brooklyn, New York, The United States
Website

Genre
Biographies & Memoirs, Nonfiction

Member Since
May 2014

URL


James McBride is a native New Yorker and a graduate of  New York City public schools. He studied composition at The Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio and received his Masters in Journalism from Columbia University in New York at age 22. He holds several honorary doctorates and is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University.  He is married with three children. He lives in Pennsylvania and New York.  

James McBride is a former staff writer for The Washington Post, People Magazine, and The Boston Globe. His work has also appeared in Essence, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times. His April, 2007 National Geographic story entitled “Hip Hop Planet” is considered a respected treatise on African American music and cultu ...more

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Popular Answered Questions

How did you and your siblings go from being beaten as a child to such a loving an appreciative relationship with your mother? This felt like a missing piece in The Color of Water. I understand that your mother too was beaten. But I'm assuming that you and your siblings did not continue the legacy. Can you fill in the missing piece?
James McBride There is no missing piece. It wasn’t a book about “beatings” It was a book about a mother’s love. We got spanked. Sometimes that works, sometimes that…moreThere is no missing piece. It wasn’t a book about “beatings” It was a book about a mother’s love. We got spanked. Sometimes that works, sometimes that doesn’t. Usually, it’s not necessary y. But if a mother loves her children, and knows how to mother them, and she believes in spankings, why not? Some of the language that is used with regard to parenting is fraught with nonsense and political implications that are misleading and used wrongly. I’m glad she spanked me. I deserved em all. (less)
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How does your background in music affect your current writing?
James McBride Music teaches you to fail. Failure teaches success. Music teaches you structure, and where you must play the ink on the page, and where you can solo a…moreMusic teaches you to fail. Failure teaches success. Music teaches you structure, and where you must play the ink on the page, and where you can solo and burst into your own song. Music, the theory of it, the analytical part of it, helps a lot.(less)
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Combine Editions

Average rating: 4.01 · 591,792 ratings · 58,894 reviews · 28 distinct works • Similar authors
The Heaven & Earth Grocery ...
3.92 avg rating — 319,729 ratings — published 2023 — 38 editions
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The Color of Water
4.15 avg rating — 133,687 ratings — published 1996 — 107 editions
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Deacon King Kong
4.16 avg rating — 80,569 ratings — published 2020 — 43 editions
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The Good Lord Bird
3.95 avg rating — 38,202 ratings — published 2013 — 53 editions
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Song Yet Sung
4.05 avg rating — 6,144 ratings — published 2008 — 28 editions
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Five-Carat Soul
4.01 avg rating — 5,346 ratings — published 2017 — 15 editions
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Miracle at St. Anna
3.95 avg rating — 4,930 ratings — published 2001 — 58 editions
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Kill 'Em and Leave: Searchi...
3.90 avg rating — 2,953 ratings — published 2016 — 26 editions
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Goat
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4.09 avg rating — 170 ratings
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Buck Boy
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4.41 avg rating — 32 ratings
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More books by James McBride…

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Quotes by James McBride  (?)
Quotes are added by the Goodreads community and are not verified by Goodreads. (Learn more)

“God is the color of water. Water doesn't have a color.”
― James McBride, The Color of Water
tags: god, religion
124 likes
Like

“I asked her if I was black or white. She replied "You are a human being. Educate yourself or you'll be a nobody!”
― James McBride, The Color of Water
tags: inspirational
87 likes
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“It was always so hot, and everyone was so polite, and everything was all surface but underneath it was like a bomb waiting to go off. I always felt that way about the South, that beneath the smiles and southern hospitality and politeness were a lot of guns and liquor and secrets.”
― James McBride, The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
tags: culture, heat, south
79 likes
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Polls

283704
2024 February Members Choice Poll...

This will remain open until Jan 13th.

Great group of books - plan to take part in the discussion if your choice of book wins. Thanks

Happy reading...

 
  9 votes, 18.8%

 
  9 votes, 18.8%

 
  9 votes, 18.8%

 
  5 votes, 10.4%

 
  5 votes, 10.4%

 
  5 votes, 10.4%

 
  4 votes, 8.3%

 
  1 vote, 2.1%

 
  1 vote, 2.1%

48 total votes
More...

Topics Mentioning This Author

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Literary Fiction ...: Hurston/Wright Legacy Award Nominees 23 97 26 août 2009 04:39  
College Students! : Summer Challenge--Official Record of Points 42 802 01 sept. 2009 05:41  
The Seasonal Read...: Civil War 60 248 11 oct. 2009 20:42  
The Seasonal Read...: This topic has been closed to new comments. FALL CHALLENGE 2009 COMPLETED TASKS 3942 2762 01 déc. 2009 06:01  
Challenge: 50 Books: Lisa's 2009 Reads 106 612 01 jan. 2010 01:07  
The Next Best Boo...: pjreads - frequent flyer 28 487 03 mai 2010 02:21  
Challenge: 50 Books: Rona's 50 for 2010 53 109 29 déc. 2010 04:27  
100+ Books in 2026: Siobhan's 100+ list for 2010 28 87 30 déc. 2010 22:25  
The Next Best Boo...: May's Group Reads Are..... 61 255 04 août 2011 07:33  

James’s Quotes

“God I am looking for the one thing I have never felt but once, and I would walk through heaven and earth to find it, if he would but let me find him, so that I could feel it; and if I were to feel it again I would never leave that feeling, or him that gave it to me." - The Dreamer”
― James McBride, Song Yet Sung
6 likes
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“The greatest gift that anyone can give anyone is LIFE. And the greatest sin a person can do is to take away that life. NEXT to that, all rules and religions in the worldare secondary, mere words and beliefs that people CHOOSE to believe and KILL and HATE by.”
― James McBride, The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother
15 likes
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