BookBrowse Reviews Neighbors and Other Stories by Diane Oliver

The history of American segregation, along with changes to it in the 1960s, is sometimes taught and discussed today in a way that is very textbook. This is a great disservice to younger people, as it fails to humanize for them the everyday experiences of those who lived during the period. Some younger people may have never thought, for example, about what a day in the life of students in college dorms looked like during the horrific growing pains of desegregation. Or about how Black students navigated studying abroad at the time. Or, more broadly, about how Black people maneuvered in interracial relationships — romantic and otherwise. Diane Oliver's Neighbors and Other Stories spotlights these perspectives and challenged my own understanding of America, during and after de facto segregation. Each short story is an observation of individual lives. Oliver wrote many of these stories ...