All Over but the Shoutin'

Chapter 9 focuses on religion and faith. It begins with a description of Bragg’s mother’s devotion to watching religious broadcasts on television. She was part of a culture that supported the TV evangelists and believed in their message of redemption through faith. This religious belief was one of the things that helped Bragg’s mother survive her difficult life.

Bragg himself tried, at age nine, to join the church-going community all around him. He went to church with his cousins and listened intently to the preacher. However, he never found the faith he sought.

This chapter covers Bragg’s life from age ten to thirteen, when he spent much of his time reading books. He was also active socially, with “a new girlfriend every year from first grade on” (96). He got his first motorized vehicle, a moped that “would run sixty miles an hour on a straightway” (93), and he and his brother played basketball on the school team.

In this chapter, Bragg describes his summer job doing grunt work on a construction site for his Uncle Ed. It was hard work in hot weather, and Bragg dreaded the end of school and the start of the summer and long workdays.