# Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

**Author:** Mildred D. Taylor
**Lexile:** 920L
**Grade range:** Grades 6–8
**Age range:** 11–14
**First published:** 1976
**Page count:** 276
**Genre:** Historical Fiction
**ISBN-13:** `9780142401125`
**ISBN-10:** `014240112X`
**Canonical URL:** https://readinglist.school/book/roll-of-thunder-hear-my-cry
**License:** [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — please credit ReadingList.school when citing.

## About this book

Nine-year-old Cassie Logan narrates a year on her family's Mississippi farm during the Great Depression, as her family fights to keep their land and their dignity under Jim Crow. Taylor's Newbery-winning novel is a staple of 6th-8th grade American history literature pairings.

## Themes

- Jim Crow South
- family and land
- racial injustice
- childhood awareness
- dignity and resistance

## Content notes

- racial violence
- racial slurs (historical context)
- threat of lynching

Common Sense Media age recommendation: 11+

## Where this book is assigned

### Common Core State Standards (ELA)

- **recommended** · 7th grade — [source: CCSS ELA Appendix B, grades 6-8 exemplar](https://achievethecore.org/page/2699)
- **recommended** · 7th grade · Georgia — [source: Georgia Standards of Excellence grade 7 aligned reading](https://www.gadoe.org/)
- **recommended** · 7th grade · Mississippi — [source: Mississippi CCR Standards grade 7 aligned text (MS setting)](https://www.mdek12.org/)
- **recommended** · 8th grade — [source: Common Core aligned summer-reading list — rising 8th grade](https://achievethecore.org/page/2699)

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