Amazing Grace

Fourth Quarter Outside Reading Book Review

Amazing Grace by Jonathan Kozol. Harper Perennial, 1996. Genre: Biography


Amazing Grace by Jonathan Kozol is a novel about the lives of people especially children in the South Bronx, New York. Kozol interviews people who tell them about there lives and others. Kozol gets information about the people affected by AIDS and also the other tragedies that happen in the South Bronx like children getting kill in a shootout. Jonathan Kozol shows the side to poverty that most of the privileged class people in America don’t know about. He also tells about inequality issues, health care problems, and educational shortcomings.

“Kozol reminds us that, with each casualty, part of the beauty of the world is extinguished, because these are children of intelligence and humor, of poetic insight and luminous faith. Amazing Grace is written in a gentle and measured tone, but you will wonder at the end, with Kozol, why the God of love does not return to earth with his avenging sword in hand.” – Barbara Ehrenreich


Amazing Grace isn’t just for teachers who want to describe what other places are like in the world, this book is for everyone. The words are not difficult to understand; Kozol comes out and just says it he doesn’t use many metaphors or beat around the bush. Even though that it is easy to understand it doesn’t take away from the emotions he makes you feel. Amazing Grace makes you go up and down like a yo-yo with emotions. You always feel sad for the children in South Bronx but I also felt happy when sone of the children did something incredible. Kozol is the one who interviews all of the people in the South Bronx so what he writes is heartfelt and honest.

“The trouble with miracles, however is that they don’t happen for most children; and a good society cannot be built on miracles or on the likelihood that they will keep occurring. There is also a degree of danger that, in emphasizing these unusual relationships and holding up for praise the very special children who can take advantage of them, without making it clear how rare these situations are, we may see to be condemning those who don’t have opportunities like these or, if they do, cannot respond to them” (160).

I really enjoyed reading Amazing Grace, Kozol has a way of writing that you feel for the kids in South Bronx. I had to read Amazing Grace for a club I am in at school, I thought it was going to be a boring book but once I started reading it I couldn’t believe how good it was. I will most likely read more of his work in the future because I loved this one.