Silence is not what Michele Norris is known for. Quite the opposite, in fact—listeners of NPR’s All Things Considered will recognize the smooth timbre of the host’s voice before she even finishes her introductory “…and I’m Michele Norris.” Silence, though, is the topic she’ll address when she appears at Bookshop Santa Cruz on Sunday to read from and sign copies of her newest book The Grace of Silence.
Norris began writing the book as an exploration of the ways the national conversation about race began to change preceding the election of President Obama. She says she wanted to put an ear to the discussion in a less conventional way. “I thought I would do that by trying to listen to private conversation,” Norris said, speaking about the book on NPR, “but as I began to listen to these hidden conversations, I also began to listen to hidden conversations in my own family.”
A social history of race became a memoir when Norris discovered secrets that had been kept from her growing up—things like the fact that her grandmother once made a living giving pancake demonstrations to Midwestern housewives dressed as Aunt Jemima, or the fact that her father was shot by a white police officer in Birmingham shortly after returning home from World War II. Her own personal revelations form the basis of Norris’ inquiry into the ways that we talk—and the ways we do not talk—about race in America.
MICHELE NORRIS reads from her book ‘The Grace of Silence’ on Sunday, Nov. 14 at 7pm at Bookshop Santa Cruz, 1520 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz. 831.423.0900. Free.
