The Warmth of Other Suns (Isabel Wilkerson, 2010)

This was probably the best book I've read all year, in a year that's been very good for my American history ongoing reading. It's a groundbreaking study that treats the movement of African Americans from the South to the North between 1915 and 1975 as a distinct migration movement rather than just a random trend. Hence, she identified populations from Texas and Louisiana that moved to California, Mississippi and Alabama to Chicago, and Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas to the mid-Atlantic and New England states. Wilkerson strikes a good balance between the personal narratives of an oral history and and academic analysis of the migration. The narratives bring you in so close that you really feel the triumphs and heartaches of the three main characters. I'd say I'd pick up her next book in a heartbeat, except this is her only book thus far. Hopefully the next great study lies ahead!