Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption - Bryan Stevenson

There's a wonderful momentum in setting a wrong right. There's an incredible grace in redemption and acceptance. Bryan Stevenson is a vessel of grace. Through the Equal Justice Initiative, Stevenson brings hope, comfort, acceptance, and redemption to those to whom the "justice" system in our country has terribly failed.

In Just Mercy, Stevenson says again and again that people are more than the worst thing they have ever done. It's one thing to say this kind of thing, but it's another to actually believe it, and through your life and actions, show others that this is true.

The history of the death penalty in the United States is a shameful story of unequal application disproportionately affecting the poor and people of color. How then is it justice? (spoiler alert, it's not). The fact that this country has absolutely put to death innocent people should give anyone pause as they talk about the reasonableness of the ultimate punishment. Couple this inexact science with the long history of racial discrimination in this country and you have a disgraceful recipe for injustice in the name of justice.

When Stevenson graduated from Harvard Law School, he set about with a mission to help others. And over the past couple of decades, he's done just that. He's championed cases such as that of Walter McMillan, sentenced to death in Alabama for a crime he did not commit, and of hundreds of children serving life sentences in our nation's penitentiaries. There is a better way, and it's because of people like Bryan Stevenson and his tireless fight for justice reform that we may someday earn the description "justice system."

5/5 Stars.