Parents' Guide to For Lamb

Parents need to know that For Lamb by Lesa Cline-Ransome (a Coretta Scott King Honor recipient) is about a Black family in 1940s Mississippi that lives with the fear of lynching and eventually must cope with the murder of one of its members. Expect potentially disturbing scenes that are consistent with the subject: multiple lynchings, a sexual assault, a bludgeoning attack, and threats of using a gun. In many tense scenes, there's a strong implication that violence could break out. The main character's mother is in a sexual relationship with another woman (they're afraid of taking their relationship public in 1940s Mississippi), and the girl hears them making love through their bedroom wall. A man with a lofty reputation has liquor on his breath at work, and adults drink whiskey in a social context. Several characters use the "N" word, consistent with encounters between hostile White people and Black people in Mississippi during the Jim Crow era. The word "cracker" is used by Black characters to refer to White characters.