[If] "Jonah's Gourd Vine" is a story with a background of sociology, "Mules and Men" is a social study with gusto of a story. Indeed, it is hard to think of anybody interested in the negro whom this new book will not delight. The southern raconteur who justly prides himself upon his large store of stories about the colored man will here find himself beaten on his own ground, but having gained a new supply of tales to tell. The student of folk-lore will find a well-filled sourcebook. And he who loves the negro, or is amused by him, or burns for his wrongs, or thinks he ought to know his place, will find, each of them, as good a portrayal of the negro's character as he is ever likely to see.

Not, either, a one-sided portrayal. The gaiety, the poetry, the resourcefulness and the wit are set down, but so also are the impulsiveness, the shiftlessness, the living in the moment only. Short of associating with the negro daily, there is no way you can learn more about him. Indeed, from Miss Hurston you will find out many things that, even if you live surrounded by negroes for a long time, you might never know. For as she says, "the negro, in spite of his open-faced laughter, his seeming acquiescence, is particularly evasive." He tells the white man what he thinks the white man wants to know, or what he feels he ought to know.

The book is divided into two parts. The first part deals with "Folk Tales" and the second with "Hoodoo." I find the second part interesting, but dare not judge it. I am aware that hoodoo plays a great part in the lives of certain negroes, but I have the teasing conviction that it has always been, and always will be over-emphasized because of those who like its appeal to the romantically macabre. The first part, however, is magnificent. (pp. 181-82)

Quite expectedly, most of these stories are humorous, and a large part of what remain are fantastic; but there are a few grim, a few ghostly and a few sardonic. Of the humorous stories, the greater part deal with slaves who outwit "de ole marster," or with animals, representing the negro, who outwit animals representing the white man. For I am sure everybody must now realize that Brer Rabbit is "the brother in black," as is also Brer Gopher when he outwits rather than outruns Brer Deer. Such ugliness as there is, is mainly in the background. (p. 182)