“An important and timely book about race in America.” - Drew Faust, Harvard Magazine
"Merging memoir, travelogue, and history, Smith fashions an affecting, often lyrical narrative of witness." - The New York Review of Books
"In this exploration of the ways we talk about — and avoid talking about — slavery, Smith blends reportage and deep critical thinking to produce a work that interrogates both history and memory." - Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe
“Raises questions that we must all address, without recourse to wishful thinking or the collective ignorance and willful denial that fuels white supremacy.” - Martha Anne Toll, The Washington Post
“Sketches an impressive and deeply affecting human cartography of America’s historical conscience…an extraordinary contribution to the way we understand ourselves.” - Julian Lucas, New York Times Book Review
"Part of what makes this book so brilliant is its bothandedness. It is both a searching historical work and a journalistic account of how these historic sites operate today. Its both carefully researched and lyrical. I mean Smith is a poet and the sentences in this book just are piercingly alive. And it’s both extremely personal—it is the author’s story—and extraordinarily sweeping. It amplifies lots of other voices. Past and present. Reading it I kept thinking about that great Alice Walker line ‘All History is Current’.” - John Green, New York Times bestselling author of The Anthropocene Reviewed
“The detail and depth of the storytelling is vivid and visceral, making history present and real. Equally commendable is the care and compassion shown to those Smith interviews — whether tour guides or fellow visitors in these many spaces. Due to his care as an interviewer, the responses Smith elicits are resonant and powerful. . . . Smith deftly connects the past, hiding in plain sight, with today's lingering effects.” - Hope Wabuke, NPR
“This isn’t just a work of history, it’s an intimate, active exploration of how we’re still constructing and distorting our history.” - Ron Charles, The Washington Post
“Both an honoring and an exposé of slavery’s legacy in America and how this nation is built upon the experiences, blood, sweat and tears of the formerly enslaved.” - The Root