Martha - if you ever get a chance to see it, you might be interested in a documentary called "A Time for Burning."
Wiki describes it as
A Time for Burning is a 1966 documentary film which explores the attempts of the minister of Augustana Lutheran Church in Omaha, Nebraska, to persuade his all-white congregation to reach out to "negro" Lutherans in the city's north side. The film was directed by San Francisco filmmaker William C. Jersey and was nominated as Best Documentary Feature in the 1968 Academy Awards. The film was commissioned by the Lutheran Church.
I've seen it, and would like to see it again. The minister in this case was a good guy, but he was up against his congregation.
I finished a novel over the weekend that was not particularly light reading, but I really got involved with the main character from the beginning.
Animal's People, by Indra Sinha, is set in a fictional version of Bhopal, 20 years after the chemical spill. 'Animal' is a young man whose spine was bent by the chemical exposure; he goes about on all fours, and claims to be animal rather than human.
The story is not particularly cheerful - although it's funny in spots and certainly has its uplifting scenes - and it's not particularly a page-turner, but I got very involved with the characters - the protesters, the volunteer doctor, the renowned singer whose breath was silenced by the chemicals, who now sings to frogs and birds - all of the characters are damaged in some way by the "Kompani" and the "Amrikans" who owned it, but they all preserve a kind of quiet dignity that I really liked.
It took me a while to get through the book - I was always able to put it down for awhile, but something (probably Animal himself) always drew me back to it.
(Sorry, I made a hash of that. The book was a finalist for the Mann Booker prize. You might check out the reviews on Amazon; for some reason I'm having a hard time describing this book.)
