A Place at the Table: The True Story of Two Men-Best Friends in Their Youth, Reunited in Adversity

Rhetorical Flourishes Alan Stoudemire and Boyce Blake grew up together in the foothills of the North Carolina Blue Ridge Mountains in the 1950s and continued to be close friends through high school. An ordinary story, except that Stoudemire was white and Blake was black. Stoudemire (1951-2000), a psychiatrist, completed A Place at the Table, a memoir of his friendship with Blake, shortly before he died of cancer. In it, he recalls how the boys' friendship helped to smooth the integration of their rural school district. He also recounts how he and Blake fell out of touch after high school, but reconnected in time to watch each other's children grow up and support each other through serious illnesses (Blake died of ALS in 1997). (June)