Sour Land

By William H. Armstrong

1971

First Published

3.66

Average Rating

116

Number of Pages

3H32M

Audio Length

Life is hard for the three Stone children. The death of their mother has left them bereft and grieving. Their father tries hard to make things better, but he is busy trying to keep their farm going. Even the land around them seems to have betrayed It is so barren that it is known as sour land. Then Moses Waters comes to teach at the black school at Cedar Corners. Moses can hear things no one else can, like the sound of the grass and the earth humming together. More than anyone else, he seems to have a special understanding of the Stone family. Only Moses can help them out of their grief. But a sour land grows sour people. There are some folks in town who don't approve of the friendship between the white Stone family and the new black teacher. And it looks like they will go to dangerous lengths to stop it.

Avg Rating

3.66

Number of Ratings

5 STARS

24%

4 STARS

37%

3 STARS

26%

2 STARS

1 STARS

goodreads

Author

William H. Armstrong

Author · 5 books

William H. Armstrong (1911 - 1999) was an American children's author and educator, best known for his 1969 Newbery Medal-winning novel, Sounder. In 1956, at the request of his school headmaster, he published his first book, a study guide called Study Is Hard Work. Armstrong followed this title with numerous other self-help books, and in 1963 he was awarded the National School Bell Award of the National Association of School Administrators for distinguished service in the interpretation of education. In 1969, Armstrong published his masterpiece, an eight-chapter novel titled Sounder about an African-American sharecropping family. Praised by critics, Sounder won the John Newbery Medal and the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award in 1970, and was adapted into a major motion picture in 1972.