Finalist for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literature
Finalist for a 2018 Southern Book Prize for Biography and History
"An absolute must-read" – Shondaland
“[Rabbit] tells how it went down with brutal honesty and outrageous humor” – New York Times
“I know a lot of people think they know what it’s like to grow up in the hood. Like maybe they watched a couple of seasons of The Wire and they got the shit all figured out. But TV doesn’t tell the whole story.” – Ms. Pat
They called her Rabbit.
Patricia Williams (aka Ms. Pat) was born and raised in Atlanta at the height of the crack epidemic. One of five children, Pat watched as her mother struggled to get by on charity, cons, and petty crimes. At age seven, Pat was taught to roll drunks for money. At twelve, she was targeted for sex by a man eight years her senior. By thirteen, she was pregnant. By fifteen, Pat was a mother of two.
Alone at sixteen, Pat was determined to make a better life for her children. But with no job skills and an eighth-grade education, her options were limited. She learned quickly that hustling and humor were the only tools she had to survive. Rabbit is an unflinching memoir of cinematic scope and unexpected humor. With wisdom and humor, Pat gives us a rare glimpse of what it’s really like to be a black mom in America.
Born and raised in Atlanta at the height of the crack epidemic, Patricia Williams (aka Ms. Pat) watched as her mother struggled to raise five children on charity, cons, and petty crimes. At age seven, Pat, known as Rabbit, was taught to roll drunks for money. At twelve, she was targeted for sex by an older man. By thirteen, she was pregnant. By fifteen, Pat was a mother of two. Alone at sixteen, Pat was determined to make a better life for her children. But with only an eighth-grade education, she had limited options. She learned quickly that hustling and humor were the only tools she had to survive. Rabbit is an unflinching memoir of cinematic scope, wisdom, and unexpected humor that gives us a rare glimpse of what it’s really like to struggle and thrive in America.
“She was able to elevate her personal stories of horror, sadness, violence, insanity into something that people can understand and relate to and see into a world that many of us don’t know.”
