Mississippi Trial, 1955 is a novel written by Chris Crowe, an American teacher and author, published in 2002. It was the recipient of the 2003 International Reading Association Award for Young Adult Novel.
Crowe's book centers around a young adolescent boy named Hiram, who is visiting his hometown in Mississippi when he encounters Emmett Till, a black teenager around his age who is also there for the same reason. While he spends more and more time in the town, Hiram witnesses many events of racism and prejudice by whites against blacks, eventually culminating in Emmett's dead, brutally marked body floating in the river. Remembering his meeting with Emmett, Hiram is determined to find out the culprits, no matter what it takes.
Mississippi Trial, 1955 is a prominent book about one of the roots of the civil rights movement, an incident that sparked outrage across America: the murdering and torturing of an African-American boy Emmett Till. The novel was critically acclaimed, winning several awards. Crowe has also written other books on the subject of Emmett Till, including Getting Away With Murder: The True Story of the Emmett Till Case. He is an advocate for teaching social justice through literature.
