All Over But the Shoutin’ Audiobook (Free)

This haunting, harrowing, gloriously moving recollection of the life for the American margin may be the story of Rick Bragg, who grew up dirt-poor in northeastern Alabama, seemingly destined for either the cotton mills or the penitentiary, and instead became a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for THE BRAND NEW York Times. It is the tale of Bragg’s dad, a hard-drinking guy having a murderous temper and the habit of operating out on the individuals who needed him many.

But at the guts of the soaring memoir is Bragg’s mother, who all went eighteen years with out a new gown so that her sons could possess school clothing and picked other’s cotton in order that her kids wouldn’t have to go on welfare alone. Evoking these lives – and the country that formed and nourished them – with artistry, honesty, and compassion, Rick Bragg brings hone the love and struggling that lie at the heart of every family.

The result is unforgettable.