Fam'ly: How We Made It Over - Paperback

by Mary Joyce McNeil Flournoy (Author)

Fam'ly is a heartwarming family saga about the author's large family of seven children, whose parents married young, possessing only minimal skills and education during the Great Depression in this country, and their struggles to rise above their marginal existence. Although both of the writer's parents had been encouraged by their families to acquire skills before getting married, the couple believed they could obtain advanced skills and have a much better life after marrying by moving from their small South Carolina rural setting to Charlotte, North Carolina, a much bigger city.

Fam'ly shares the story of the young black couple's struggles amid a backdrop of the Jim Crow and segregation era and a depressed economy to overcome adversity; to better their lives, their extended family members' lives as well as their children's lives; and to make sure all their seven children obtained a higher education so they could have a better quality of life than they had experienced.

The narrative tells how the pair's tenacity, strong bonds of love and support from their immediate and extended families--some of whom had followed the Great Migration and moved to Northern cities such as Brooklyn and Bronx, New York--and love and faith in God helped them to overcome obstacles and accomplish goals in their lives.

The story also shows that those you help or who help you do not have to be members of your immediate or extended families. They can be members of various family circles in your life, like church, work, or community families.

Fam'ly highlights the efforts of an extended family--not just the immediate family--working together to help one another succeed. While the book does have its serious side, it is lighthearted, funny, informative, and entertaining but with a historical, factual, and real-life backdrop.