Loving across the Color Line: A White Adoptive Mother Learns About Race

What would a liberal, white, civil rights law professor have to learn about race? When Sharon Rush adopted an African American girl, she quickly discovered the need to throw out old assumptions and start learning over again.

This is the moving, heartfelt memoir of a mother and daughter's loving relationship that opened the author's eyes to the harsh realities of the American racial divide. Only by living with her daughter through the day-to-day encounters and life passages did Rush learn that racism is far more devastating to blacks than most whites can ever imagine.

Some of the stories are funny, others are sad, a few are almost unbelievable. But they all are poignant because they illustrate how insightful a little black girl of three can be about race and justice. Their stories also recount the author's struggle, as her daughter grew older, to come to grips with her own growing awareness of racism in America.

With love and spirituality, Rush and her daughter live a deeply joyous life, just as they both have become increasingly active in working publicly and privately against racism. Readers who journey across the color line with the author and her daughter will come away with a real-life encounter with racism and a deeper understanding of it.