I’ve been leading a charmed reading life of late. Almost everything I’ve carried in my bus bag for the last year (plus) has been worth its (considerable) weight in gold: informative, compelling, inspiring. But even all this good bus reading didn’t prepare me for my most recent ride read, which absolutely rocked my world.

The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks, by civil rights scholar Jeanne Theoharis, is the most comprehensive—really, the only—political biography written about my sweet Chicklet‘s namesake. It is the book I would have written myself, had I more impressive credentials and initiative.

There is so much to learn from Theoharis’s research, even for someone who has read essentially everything available to read by (and about) Mrs. Parks. Rebellious Life examines the Rosa Parks beyond the fable. It explores her lifetime of activism—including her half century in Bus Nerd’s hometown of Detroit—and all of the ways she contributed to the struggle for freedom and justice. I am in awe of the depth of her sacrifice and commitment to her ideals. As Theoharis says in the book’s introduction:

It is a rare gift as a scholar to get to deconstruct the popular narrative and demythologize an historical figure, and in the process, discover a more impressive and substantive person underneath.

This, of course, means you’re in for many more (and more substantive) Parks-related posts in the future.