It connected me more deeply with how quickly things were changing. However, I didn’t mind this change in storytelling.

Information would be introduced and move on from in the same breath sometimes. Overall, the storytelling in March: Book Three felt choppier than the previous two. Throughout this volume, we hear directly from Lewis how these events have changed the movement and him. The Civil Rights movement becomes divided between those who believe in non-violence and those who believe that time is over. There is violence in the streets and the government still won’t provide protection to peaceful protesters. Registration volunteers go missing, two white and one black, and turn up as corpses weeks later. Opening with the bombing, March: Book Three shows clearly how violent and bloody the struggle for Civil Rights has become. Meanwhile, realizing he no longer agrees with the direction and focuses on SNCC, Lewis steps down to continue his own activist journey, culminating with the march from Selma to Montgomery, Bloody Sunday. As Johnson takes the Presidency, a new push for civil rights and voting reforms come to the fore. Civil Rights leaders and activists head to the 1964 Democratic National Convention to gain black seats for Mississippi delegates, an entirely white delegation during a critical election. They are, expectedly, met with excessive violence and hate and no one steps in to help protect these volunteers.

Through relentless action, SNCC, headed by Lewis, continues to force the nation to confront its own blatant injustice.The Freedom Summer sees both black and white volunteers registering black votes, particularly in the South. The conclusion of March picks up right where March: Book Two leaves off, with the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham in 1963. The conclusion to John Lewis’s graphic memoir brings the events of the 1960s to a close with vibrant, engaging realism. After reading March: Book One and March: Book Two, I knew to expect an intense, emotional experience reading March: Book Three.

March book three