A rarely spotlighted corner of the early days of the civil rights movement is the subject of Sarah Azaransky's The Dream is Freedom: Pauli Murray and American Democratic Faith. Murray spearheaded nonviolent black activism in the 1940s, organizing sit-ins of segregated Washington, D.C., restaurants and pioneering the use of the term "Jane Crow" to describe combinations of racism and sexism. Recently, she became a saint in the Episcopal Church. Azaransky examines Murray's body of writings, including published work, letters, journals and more across 50 years, leading to her sermons of the 1980s. —Zack Smith