All Over but the Shoutin' by Rick BraggAll Over but the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg is an autobiography that starts from Mr. Bragg's poor childhood in a family which included an abusive, alcoholic father, an incredibly powerful angel of a mother and his two brothers, and follows him throughout his career as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist at the New York Times. The author states at the beginning of the book that readers will laugh and cry while reading it. He was right on both counts. The Bragg family grew up with virtually nothing. The father left the family several times, offering no financial help and stealing whatever he could before leaving. When he was there, he was usually drunk and physically abusive to the mother. He rarely attacked children, but when he did, the mother was always there to offer protection. Mr. Bragg's mother's life consisted of working to the point of exhaustion and using whatever money she had on the children. The second half of the book follows the development of Mr. Bragg's career and family. Mr. Bragg has covered various events such as the Miami riots, Haitian atrocities and the Susan Smith affair, among others for his work. I've only read four books my entire life for school, but this is the best one I've read. There are many things I learned from the book. What struck me most is that it's hard to watch people live in shame because they can hide it so well, almost as if it doesn't bother them at all. I grew up in a middle class family and I just didn't understand what it meant to be so broke that you were ashamed to be around people who had money. This thought never crossed my mind. I bet it wouldn't take much effort for me to identify a time in my life when I was cruel to poor people; judge them critically. Especially without knowing what their situation was. They could have had family or financial problems, maybe their house had simply burned down. It could have been any number of things, but either way it was wrong. There were many parts of the book that had me hooked; I couldn't stop reading no matter what happened.