Eleanor Murphy Book Group: All Over But the Shoutin'

Bragg relates his own segregation-era Alabama rags-to-riches tale. Abandoned by her husband, Bragg's mother was left to raise three sons on her own. They were dirt poor, but Bragg remembers childhood as being "sweet and warm," thanks largely to his mother. Bragg never forgets what he owes her, and the book's climax is the Pulitzer Prize award ceremony, which his mother attended, having taken her first ride on an airplane and her first ride on an elevator to get there.