Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson 
          
          
                                  The US has the highest rate of incarceration in the 
                                  world. One in every 15 people born there today is 
                                  expected to go to prison. 
                                  For black men this figure rises to one in three. And 
                                  death row is disproportionately black. 
                                  Bryan Stevenson grew up poor in the racially 
                                  segregated South. His innate sense of justice made 
                                  him a brilliant young lawyer, and one of his first 
                                  defendants was Walter McMillian, a black man 
                                  sentenced to die for the murder of a white woman 
                                  – a crime he insisted he didn’t commit. The case 
                                  drew Bryan into a tangle of conspiracy, political 
                                  machination, startling racial inequality, and legal 
                                  brinksmanship – and transformed his 
                                  understanding of mercy and justice forever. 
                                  At once an unforgettable account of an idealistic 
                                  lawyer’s coming of age and a moving portrait of the 
                                  lives of those he has defended, Just Mercy is an 
                                  inspiring argument for compassion in the pursuit of 
                                  justice. 
                                   
        ‘Just Mercy should be read by people of conscience in every civilized country in the world to 
          
     discover what happens when revenge and retribution replace justice and mercy. It is as gripping to 
          
      read as any legal thriller, and what hangs in the balance is nothing less than the soul of a great 
                   nation.’ – Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Laureate 
          
         Bryan Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative in 
       Montgomery, Alabama. He is a widely acclaimed public-interest lawyer who has dedicated his 
          
      career to helping the poor, the incarcerated, and the condemned. Under his leadership, EJI has 
          
       won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent 
        death-row prisoners, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding 
          
      children prosecuted as adults. EJI has won relief for 115 death-row prisoners illegally convicted or 
          
      sentenced. His work fighting poverty and challenging racial discrimination in the criminal-justice 
                      system has won him numerous awards.