Black Lives Matter: From a Moment to a Movement. By Laurie Collier Hillstrom. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2018. 164 pages. Acid-free $39 (ISBN 978-1-4408-6570-1). E-book Available (978-1-4408-6571-8), call for pricing.

The Black Lives Matter movement began as a social media hashtag (#BlackLivesMatter) by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullers, and Opal Tometi to bring awareness when George Zimmerman was acquitted in the fatal shooting of Tayvon Martin in 2012. It gained momentum in 2014 after the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, with nationwide protests against the growing pattern of police-involved shootings of unarmed African American men. Social media has allowed the movement to organically grow by sharing videos, observations, and information.

This book is well researched and documented. It is a factual account of the people, places, and events of the Black Lives Matter movement. This book correctly situates the Black Lives Matter movement within the long history of racism in America. At 164 pages, this is not a long book, which is appropriate based on the relative newness of the formal Black Lives Matter movement. This length and the relatively small physical size of the book (6" x 9") is conducive to student checkout.

Without question, the book reflects that the Black Lives Matter movement is about people. The primary documents section is primarily speeches by New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Eric Holder, and other officials after the investigations of police shootings of African American men. There is one intelligence report from the FBI. This section needed a brief introduction for context. The biographical sketches section provides good information on the people involved in the Black Lives Matter movement. This is a good starting point for students who want to do further research. The index emphasizes people involved in the Black Lives Matter movement. The timeline is an excellent overview of important topics in racism with good detail of the incidents within the Black Lives Matter movement. There is strong documentation in each chapter and a useful annotated bibliography in the back matter.

There is one other similar book, The Making of Black Lives Matter: A Brief History of an Idea (Oxford University Press, 2007) by Christopher J. LeBron. LeBron’s book focuses on how to address the problem of racism; Black Lives Matter: From a Moment to a Movement factually documents the history and origin of the movement. The only other similar information about this topic is found online.

This book creates a clear, permanent source for the Black Lives Matter movement to situate it in the long history of racism in America. This is especially important since the movement has been primarily documented on webpages and social media, which can be deleted or moved at any time. It is appropriate for high school and university libraries as a secondary source or to encourage further research on the Internet.—Terry Darr, Library Director, Loyola Blakefield, Towson, Maryland