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I finally finished this book!!! The story was drugged out. It shouldn't have took me 4 months to read this book. I didn't enjoy this book like I did with Gone with the Wind. I rated this book a 3 out of 5 stars.

This was my #DoubleSpin for July and I managed to finish it before the Olympics arrived to distract me. This book covers Hattie McDaniel‘s life after she won the Oscar for her role in Gone With the Wind. It was well-written and I enjoyed it but it was hard to read about all the racism and backlash she endured. One thing that was fun were all the celebrities and notable people who come into her story.

My lunchtime reading today. I‘m trying to finish it before the Olympics start on Friday! (I don‘t count anything before the Opening Ceremony!)

A book with a #gray cover from the #tbr shelf 📚

#coverlove

🩶📚🩶

📖𝓑𝓸𝓸𝓴 𝓡𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓮𝔀👑

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐐𝐮𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐒𝐮𝐠𝐚𝐫 𝐇𝐢𝐥𝐥 by 𝐑𝐞𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐚 𝐓𝐚𝐭𝐞 is the fascinating, heartbreaking, fictionalized story of Hattie McDaniel's too-short, remarkable life. She fought against racism & discrimination, & achieved “firsts,“ including winning an Oscar, but was criticized for accepting “demeaning“ roles when the only parts available to her because she was Black were domestics & enslaved women. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Hattie McDaniel is now on my radar. Society handicapped her in ways that were unjust, unkind and down right hateful at times. History is an important fact of who we are and where we are today. There were many moments during my reading that I had to close the book and say a quick prayer. The author understood the assignment…her words flowed flawlessly and set in my soul in a manner that allows me to truly appreciate who Hattie McDaniel was.

The amount of research that must‘ve gone into this one is impressive. Learned so much about Hattie McDaniel that I hadn‘t known before. Tate did a beautiful job of bringing Hattie to life. Amazing how many stars and future stars she knew during her day. Also didn‘t realize just how many films she‘d actually been in, though I was aware she‘d been on stage before she did film.

I was lucky enough to hear this author speak at a Writers Festival. She was very engaging and I found the topic interesting. She looks at both the novel and movie of ‘Gone With The Wind‘ and how the mythology surrounding the Civil War, slavery and the south in general, is used and also mirrors the lies and deceit of Trumpism and most recently the January 6 insurrection. Very interesting reading.

(1991) This was the bestselling novel in the U.S. for 1991 and ... ugh.

I did not like it. But it wasn't likely that I would, since I dislike Gone With the Wind in a way that's hard to describe but "overrated Lost Cause propaganda" scratches the surface. This has less Lost Cause propaganda, but nevertheless fails to be a better book.

(Clearly, I'm not the target audience. So ymmv, etc.)

Dear authors, please don't start your 800-plus-pagers with "This will be over soon ..."

I can tell it's a lie.