Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth
Sarah Smarsh, 2018
Scribner
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781501133091
Summary
Longlisted, 2018 National Book Award-Nonfiction
An eye-opening memoir of working-class poverty in the American Midwest.
During Sarah Smarsh’s turbulent childhood in Kansas in the 1980s and 1990s, the forces of cyclical poverty and the country’s changing economic policies solidified her family’s place among the working poor.
By telling the story of her life and the lives of the people she loves, Smarsh challenges us to look more closely at the class divide in our country and examine the myths about people thought to be less because they earn less.
Her personal history affirms the corrosive impact intergenerational poverty can have on individuals, families, and communities, and she explores this idea as lived experience, metaphor, and level of consciousness.
Smarsh was born a fifth generation Kansas wheat farmer on her paternal side and the product of generations of teen mothers on her maternal side. Through her experiences growing up as the daughter of a dissatisfied young mother and raised predominantly by her grandmother on a farm thirty miles west of Wichita, we are given a unique and essential look into the lives of poor and working class Americans living in the heartland.
Combining memoir with powerful analysis and cultural commentary, Heartland is an uncompromising look at class, identity, and the particular perils of having less in a country known for its excess. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1980-81 (?)
• Where—Kansas, USA
• Education—2 B.As., University of Kansas; M.F.A., Columbia University
• Awards—Joan Shorenstein Fellowship, Harvard University
• Currently—lives in Kansas
Sarah Smarsh is an educator, journalist and author, and a fifth generation Kansan. Her family and growing-up years are the subject of her 2018 book, Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, a book that takes a hard look at the devastation poverty wreaks on rural mid-westerners.
Smarsh became a published author at nine years of age when her school teacher, Mr. Cheatham, sent in a story about her family to a children's magazine. It was published as a two-page spread, complete with illustrations.
Smarsh went on to get undergraduate degrees in English and Journalism from Kansas University and then an M.F.A. from Columbia University. She has taught nonfiction writing at the university level: Columbia University, Ottawa University, Lawrence Center for the Arts, and as an Associate Professor at Wabash University.
Heartland is her fourth book; she has also written two histories of Kansas and a collection of essays.
As a journalist, Smarsh has covered socioeconomic class, politics, and public policy for The Guardian (UK), VQR, NewYorker.com, Harpers.org, Texas Observer, and others. She is currently a Joan Shorenstein Fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
She lives in Kansas. (Adapted from various online sources.)
Book Reviews
Smarsh is an invaluable guide to flyover country, worth 20 abstract-noun-espousing op-ed columnists.… A deeply humane memoir with crackles of clarifying insight, Heartland is one of a growing number of important works—including Matthew Desmond's Evicted and Amy Goldstein's Janesville—that together merit their own section in nonfiction aisles across the country: America's postindustrial decline. Or, perhaps, simply: class.
Francesca Mari - New York Times Book Review
In her sharply-observed, big-hearted memoir, Heartland, Smarsh chronicles the human toll of inequality, her own childhood a case study …what this book offers is a tour through the messy and changed reality of the American dream, and a love letter to the unruly but still beautiful place she called home.
Boston Globe
A poignant look at growing up in a town 30 miles from the nearest city; learning the value and satisfaction of hard, blue-collar work, and then learning that the rest of the country see that work as something to be pitied; watching her young mother's frustration with living at the "dangerous crossroads of gender and poverty" and understanding that such a fate might be hers, too. This idea is the thread that Smarsh so gracefully weaves throughout the narrative; she addresses the hypothetical child she might or might not eventually have and in doing so addresses all that the next generation Middle Americans living in poverty will face.
Buzzfeed
The difficulty of transcending poverty is the message behind this personal history of growing up in the dusty farmlands of Kansas, where "nothing was more painful …than true things being denied." …The takeaway? The working poor don't need our pity; they need to be heard above the din of cliché and without so-called expert interpretation. Smarsh's family are expert enough to correct any misunderstandings about their lives.
Oprah.com
Startlingly vivid.… [A]n absorbing, important work in a country that needs to know more about itself.
Christian Science Monitor
Smarsh’s family history, tracing generations of teen mothers and Kansas farmer-laborers, forsakes detailed analysis of Trumpland poverty in favor of a first-person perspective colored by a sophisticated (if general) understanding of structural inequality. But most importantly, her project is shot through with compassion and pride for the screwed-over working class, even while narrating her emergence from it, diving into college instead of motherhood.
Vulture
Sarah Smarsh looks at class divides in the United States while sharing her own story of growing up in poverty before ultimately becoming a fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. Her memoir doesn’t just focus on her own story; it also examines how multiple generations of her family were affected by economic policies and systems.
Bustle
If you’re working towards a deeper understanding of our ruptured country, then Sarah Smarsh’s memoir and examination of poverty in the American heartland is an essential read. Smarsh chronicles her childhood on the poverty line in Kansas in the ‘80s and ‘90s, and the marginalization of people based on their income. When did earning less mean a person was worth less?
Refinery29
(Starred review) Candid and courageous memoir of growing up in a family of working-class farmers…. Smarsh’s raw and intimate narrative exposes a country of economic inequality that "has failed its children.
Publishers Weekly
[A] countervailing voice to J.D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy, which blamed individual choices …for any one person ending up in poverty.… While Smarsh ends on a hopeful note, she offers a searing indictment of how the poor are viewed and treated in this country.
Library Journal
(Starred review) [T]he author emphasizes how those with solid financial situations often lack understanding about families such as hers.… A potent social and economic message embedded within an affecting memoir.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. At the beginning of the memoir, Smarsh writes that, as a child, "I heard a voice unlike the ones in my house or on the news that told me my place in the world." What did this other voice tell her? What did the people in her house and on the news say about her?
2. Smarsh is the product of generations of teen pregnancy on her mother’s side. She writes that she was like a penny in a purse, "not worth much, according to the economy, but kept in production." How did this legacy of teenage pregnancy affect her family’s social and economic mobility?
3. Smarsh and her brother were each born just weeks before Reagan won an election, and his economic policies had a tremendous impact on her childhood. Can you describe what that impact looked like?
4. Smarsh describes an incident in which she, as a toddler, pulled a chest of drawers onto herself, forcing her barely postpartum mother to injure herself lifting it up. Smarsh’s father was at work. How does this accident demonstrate the dangers of rural poverty and the fault lines in Jeannie and Nick’s relationship? Are the two related?
5. There were many, many car wrecks in the author’s life and in the lives of members of her family. Why do you think that is?
6. Teresa, Smarsh’s paternal grandmother, had untreated "woman problems" in her youth, according to Nick. What kinds of problems might he have been referring to? How was life in rural Kansas different for women than it was for their farmer husbands?
7. Smarsh writes, "When I was well into adulthood, the United States developed the notion that a dividing line of class and geography separated two essentially different kinds of people." Do you think that’s true? How does Smarsh straddle that line?
8. Betty often said that homeless people should "get a job," even though she and her family struggled economically—and even though she often gave money to those same people. How do you think her values were affected by the class system?
9. Do you believe, as Smarsh writes, that "in America …the house is the ultimate status symbol, and ownership is a source of economic pride"? What do you think the family’s transience meant to Nick, Jeannie, Smarsh, and her brother?
10. How did Bob’s newspaper job and middle-class stability affect the family’s economic situation?
11. Many of the women in Smarsh’s family endured physical violence at the hands of their boyfriends, husbands, and fathers. In what ways does gendered violence inhibit economic stability?
12. Smarsh writes that the women in her family had an "old wisdom" that had more to do with intuition than knowledge or education. Where do you see this in action in the lives of female characters?
13. Consider the specific reality of Smarsh’s life as a high-achieving high school student. What pushed her to excel?
14. What social realities did Smarsh meet in college? How was her life different from those of her fellow students, and how was it similar?
15. Smarsh argues that "this country has failed its children." Do you agree? How does her story demonstrate that, or fail to?
(Questions issued by the publishers.)
Untamed
Glennon Doyle, 2020
Random House
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781984801258
Summary
In her most revealing and powerful memoir yet, the beloved activist, speaker, and bestselling author of Love Warrior and Carry On, Warrior explores the joy and peace we discover when we stop striving to meet the expectations of the world, and start trusting the voice deep within us.
This is how you find yourself.
There is a voice of longing inside each woman. We strive so mightily to be good: good partners, daughters, mothers, employees, and friends.
We hope all this striving will make us feel alive. Instead, it leaves us feeling weary, stuck, overwhelmed, and underwhelmed.
We look at our lives and wonder: Wasn’t it all supposed to be more beautiful than this? We quickly silence that question, telling ourselves to be grateful, hiding our discontent—even from ourselves.
For many years, Glennon Doyle denied her own discontent. Then, while speaking at a conference, she looked at a woman across the room and fell instantly in love. Three words flooded her mind: There She Is.
At first, Glennon assumed these words came to her from on high. But she soon realized they had come to her from within. This was her own voice—the one she had buried beneath decades of numbing addictions, cultural conditioning, and institutional allegiances. This was the voice of the girl she had been before the world told her who to be.
Glennon decided to quit abandoning herself and to instead abandon the world’s expectations of her. She quit being good so she could be free. She quit pleasing and started living.
Soulful and uproarious, forceful and tender, Untamed is both an intimate memoir and a galvanizing wake-up call. It is the story of how one woman learned that a responsible mother is not one who slowly dies for her children, but one who shows them how to fully live.
It is the story of navigating divorce, forming a new blended family, and discovering that the brokenness or wholeness of a family depends not on its structure but on each member’s ability to bring her full self to the table.
And it is the story of how each of us can begin to trust ourselves enough to set boundaries, make peace with our bodies, honor our anger and heartbreak, and unleash our truest, wildest instincts so that we become women who can finally look at ourselves and say: There She Is.
Untamed shows us how to be brave. As Glennon insists: The braver we are, the luckier we get. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—March 20, 1976
• Where—Burke, Virginia, USA
• Education—B.A., James Madison University
• Awards—(see below)
• Currently—lives in Naples, Florida
Glennon Doyle (formerly Doyle Melton) is a New York Times bestselling author of Untamed (2020), Love Warrior (2016), and Carry On, Warrior (2012). She is an activist, philanthropist and the creator of the online community Momastery. She is also president of Together Rising, a non-profit that has raised more than four million dollars for women and children in crisis.
Doyle was born in Burke, Virginia, and comes from a close family that includes one sister, Amanda Doyle. She completed her B.A. at James Madison University in 1998 and became a teacher in Northern Virginia. During her time at James Madison University.
Career
Doye began her online writing career in 2009, with the creation of her blog, Momastery. The funny, conversational and tell-all nature of her writing quickly gained popularity. Viral blog posts beginning with "2011 Lesson #2: Don't Carpe Diem" led to the publication of her memoir, Carry On, Warrior, and the growth of her social media audience.
Her 2016 memoir, Love Warrior, became an Oprah Book Selection. Doyle describes her career and life philosophy like this:
Life is brutal. But it's also beautiful. Brutiful, I call it. Life's brutal and beautiful are woven together so tightly that they can't be separated. Reject the brutal, reject the beauty. So now I embrace both, and I live well and hard and real. My job is to wake up every day, say yes to life's invitation, and let millions of women watch me get up off the floor, walk, stumble, and get back up again.
Glennon is a sought-after public speaker, and her work has been featured on The Today Show, The Talk, OWN, and NPR; in the New York Times, Ladies' Home Journal, Glamour, Family Circle, Parents Magazine, Newsweek,Woman's Day, and The Huffington Post; and in other television and print outlets.
Awards
In 2013, Carry On, Warrior received the Books for a Better Life Best Relationship Award and was a finalist in the Goodreads Choice Awards for "Best Memoir & Autobiography." In 2014, Parents Magazine named Doyle and Momastery the winner of its award for Best All-Around at Social Media. (Author bio adapted from the publisher and Wikipedia Retrieved 9/10/2016.)
Book Reviews
Doyle might just be the patron saint of female empowerment.… Here she inspires other women to listen to their intuition and break free of what cages them.… Her memoir has a message as clear as a "go" signal: Find and honor your truest self.
People
Filled with hopeful messages… encourag[ing] women to reject the status quo and follow their intuition.… This testament to female empowerment and self-love, with an endearing coming-out story at the center, will delight readers.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review) She is a terrific storyteller.… Whether discussing her children or the world outside,… her goal as a memoirist (and as a person) is to defy expectations and to help others break out of their cultural cages.… A bracing jolt of honesty.
Booklist
An emotional gut punch… [and] an in-depth look at a courageous woman eager to share the wealth of her experiences by embracing vulnerability and reclaiming her inner strength and resiliency. Doyle offers another lucid, inspiring chronicle of female empowerment.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers Book Club Resources. They can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
(Resources by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)
Another Good Dog: One Famiy and Fifty Foster Dogs
Cara Sue Achterberg, 2018
Pegasus Books
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781681777931
Summary
A warm and entertaining memoir about what happens when you foster fifty dogs in less than two years—and how the dogs save you as much as you save them.
When Cara felt her teenaged children slipping away and saw an empty nest on the horizon, she decided the best way to fill that void was with dogs—lots of them—and so her foster journey began.
In 2015, her Pennsylvania farm became a haven for Operation Paws for Homes.
There were the nine puppies at once, which arrived with less than a day’s notice; a heart- worm positive dog; a deeply traumatized stray pup from Iraq; and countless others who just needed a gentle touch and a warm place to sleep. Operation Paws for Homes rescues dogs from high-kill shelters in the rural south and shuttles them north to foster homes like Cara’s on the way to their forever homes.
What started as a search for a good dog, led to an epiphany that there wasn’t just one that could ll the hole left in her heart from her children gaining independence—she could save dozens along the way. The stories of these remarkable dogs— including an eighty-pound bloodhound who sang arias for the neighbors—and the joy they bring to Cara and her family (along with a few chewed sofa cushions) fill the pages of this touching and inspiring new book that reveals the wonderful rewards of fostering.
When asked how she can possibly say goodbye to that many loveable pups, Cara says, “If I don’t give this one away, I can’t possibly save another.”
Filled with humanity and hope, Another Good Dog will take the reader on an journey of smiles, laughs, and tears—and lead us to wonder how many other good dogs are out there and what we can do to help. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1965-66
• Where—N/A
• Education—B.A., Averett University; B.A., Eastern University
• Currently—lives in New Freedom, Pennsylvania, USA
Cara Sue Achterberg is a writer of three novels, a self-help book, and a memoir. She is also a blogger, journalist, a wife and mother, and a serial dog foster mother.
In Living Intentionally, Achterberg shares stories, ideas, resources, and even recipes to help readers live a fuller, healthier and intentional life. The book came out in 2014.
Achterberg published her first novel, I'm Not Her, in 2015; her second novel, Girls' Weekend, and third, Practicing Normal, both came out in 2016.
In 2018 she issued Another Good Dog: One Family and Fifty Foster Dogs, a memoir about her family and family-life caring for foster dogs.
Her essays and articles have been published in anthologies, magazines, and on websites. She also writes frequently for the York (PA) Daily Record. Achterberg lives on a hillside farm in south-central Pennsylvania with her husband. She also has horses and two grown children. (Adapted from various online sources.)
Visit the author blogs HERE … and HERE.
Book Reviews
Saddened by her emptying nest, Cara Sue Achterberg started fostering dogs—dozens of them. Here she shares the journey (and some supercute photos).
Peope
What’s unexpected are Achterberg’s personal reveals: her husband’s "It has to stop" ultimatum…. Some readers may find the… drumbeat too repetitive, but the stories and photos will delight those who have a soft spot for dogs and the dog rescue mission.
Publishers Weekly
Witty and full of love, [this] memoir beautifully captures the personalities of the dogs she’s helped save…. This easy read is a must for animal lovers and those interested in volunteering with animals and a good choice for reluctant readers.
Booklist
Filled with humanity and hope, Another Good Dog will take the reader on an journey of smiles, laughs, and tears—and lead us to wonder how many other good dogs are out there and what we can do to help.
Shelf Awareness
A writer's account of how becoming a foster "dog parent" changed her life …and gave her a renewed sense of purpose …[T]his book blends insight and entertainment to tell an unforgettable story…. A compassionate and humane canine tale.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for ANOTHER GOOD DOG … then take off on your own:
1. The author describes the pain of losing her beloved hound of 17 years as having "left a gaping hole" in her family's "collective heart." Have you experienced the loss of a pet? What makes the loss of a creature so profound?
2. How easy or difficult would you find fostering dogs: taking them in, caring for them, and having to let them go?
3. Of the many dogs the author fostered in Another Good Dog, which ones were your favorites? Which dogs would have been hardest for you to say goodbye to? Were there any you would have glady (or reluctantly) given up on?
4. Talk about some of the particularly tough challenges she faced—perhaps working with dogs traumatized by cruelty …or the job of weaning nine puppies.
5. Achterberg talks about "how bad my addiction [to fostering] had become," a habit that was testing her marriage and her husband's patience. Did you feel any sympathy for him? Or were you impatient with his complaining?
6. Follow-up to Question 5: Achterberg faced other family complications, including her son's health issuses and her daughter's beauty pageant. How difficult was it for the author to juggle the various demands placed on her from all different directions? Did you ever reach the point where you felt she had over committed herself—that her husband was right to present her with his enough-is-enough ultimatum?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)
Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II
Liza Mundy, 2017
Hachette Book Group
432 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780316352536
Summary
Code Girls reveals a hidden army of female cryptographers, whose work played a crucial role in ending World War II.… Mundy has rescued a piece of forgotten history, and given these American heroes the recognition they deserve. —Nathalia Holt, bestselling author of Rise of the Rocket Girls
Recruited by the U.S. Army and Navy from small towns and elite colleges, more than ten thousand women served as codebreakers during World War II.
While their brothers and boyfriends took up arms, these women moved to Washington and learned the meticulous work of code-breaking. Their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and gave them access to careers previously denied to them.
A strict vow of secrecy nearly erased their efforts from history; now, through dazzling research and interviews with surviving code girls, bestselling author Liza Mundy brings to life this riveting and vital story of American courage, service, and scientific accomplishment. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
Liza Mundy is the New York Times bestselling author of The Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II (2017), The Richer Sex: How the New Majority of Female Breadwinners Is Transforming Sex, Love and Family (2012), and Michelle: A Biography (2008)
Miundy has worked as a reporter at the Washington Post and contributed to numerous publications including The Atlantic, Time, New Republic, Slate, Mother Jones, and The Guardian.
She is a frequent commentator on countless prominent national television, radio, and online news outlets and has positioned herself, at the prestigious New America Foundation, as one of the nation’s foremost experts on women and work issues. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
Mundy's fascinating book suggests that the Code Girls' influence did play a role in defining modern Washington and challenging gender roles — changes that still matter 75 years later.
Washingtonian
Mundy strikes historical gold in this appealing tale of wartime intelligence work.… [P]ersuasively shows that recognizing women’s contributions to the war effort is critical to understanding Allied victory.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Mundy teases out …stories based on extensive interviews with the surviving codebreakers.… [T]his is indispensable and fascinating history. —Barrie Olmstead, Sacramento P.L.
Library Journal
(Starred review.) Despite…omissions and the occasional cliche, the book is a winner. [D]escriptions of codes and ciphers…are remarkably clear and accessible. A well-researched, compellingly written.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What particular skills and characteristics did the Army and Navy look for in the women recruited to their code-breaking programs? How were stereotypes about women employed or challenged in the recruitment effort?
2. How did World War Two affect personal and romantic relationships? What were Americans’ attitudes toward marriage then—and did those attitudes change at all for the "code girls" generation?
3. Why do you think Dot Braden and Ruth "Crow" Weston became such great friends? If they had met in other circumstances or in peacetime, do you think they would have gotten along just as well?
4. Consider the various motivations Mundy cites for the women who signed up as code breakers. Do you think they differed from those of the men serving in America’s military then?
5. Some of the code girls were affected by the extended secrecy of their work. How might keeping secrets, however necessary, affect a person’s relationships or her identity in the world?
6. What were the particular successes and struggles of Agnes Driscoll? Why might she have eventually resorted "to extreme measures to retain her authority"?
7. What does it mean that the organizational hierarchy of Arlington Hall was relatively "flat"? How was this beneficial to the code girls?
8. Frank Raven, while acknowledging the skills of the "damn good gals," also concluded that many of the code girls were "damn pretty gals." What effect might this statement and the perspective of people like Raven have had on the women and their work?
9. Barnard’s Virginia Gildersleeve noticed in the marching WAVES "a remarkable cross section of the women of the United States of America, from all our economic and social classes … and from all our multitude of racial origins and religions." What might have caused such diversity and co-operation, and how do you think this changed after the war, if at all?
10. What were the challenges for many of the women after the war?
11. Why do you think these women’s contributions to cryptanalysis remained a secret for so long?
12. Mundy suggests that "many of the code-breaking women … advance[d] the feminist movement." Do you agree?
13. In January 2016, the American armed services finally lifted a ban on women serving in positions of direct combat. What challenges do you think women still face in the military today?
(Questions from the author's website.)
Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
David Zucchino, 2020
Grove/Atlantic
336 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780802128386
Summary
From Pulitzer Prize-winner David Zucchino comes a searing account of the Wilmington riot and coup of 1898, an extraordinary event unknown to most Americans.
By the 1890s, Wilmington was North Carolina’s largest city and a shining example of a mixed-race community.
It was a bustling port city with a burgeoning African American middle class and a Fusionist government of Republicans and Populists that included black aldermen, police officers and magistrates.
There were successful black-owned businesses and an African American newspaper, The Record. But across the state—and the South—white supremacist Democrats were working to reverse the advances made by former slaves and their progeny.
In 1898, in response to a speech calling for white men to rise to the defense of Southern womanhood against the supposed threat of black predators, Alexander Manly, the outspoken young Record editor, wrote that some relationships between black men and white women were consensual. His editorial ignited outrage across the South, with calls to lynch Manly.
But North Carolina’s white supremacist Democrats had a different strategy. They were plotting to take back the state legislature in November “by the ballot or bullet or both,” and then use the Manly editorial to trigger a “race riot” to overthrow Wilmington’s multi-racial government.
Led by prominent citizens including Josephus Daniels, publisher of the state’s largest newspaper, and former Confederate Colonel Alfred Moore Waddell, white supremacists rolled out a carefully orchestrated campaign that included raucous rallies, race-baiting editorials and newspaper cartoons, and sensational, fabricated news stories.
With intimidation and violence, the Democrats suppressed the black vote and stuffed ballot boxes (or threw them out), to win control of the state legislature on November eighth.
Two days later, more than 2,000 heavily armed Red Shirts swarmed through Wilmington, torching the Record office, terrorizing women and children, and shooting at least sixty black men dead in the streets. The rioters forced city officials to resign at gunpoint and replaced them with mob leaders. Prominent blacks—and sympathetic whites—were banished. Hundreds of terrified black families took refuge in surrounding swamps and forests.
This brutal insurrection is a rare instance of a violent overthrow of an elected government in the U.S. It halted gains made by blacks and restored racism as official government policy, cementing white rule for another half century.
It was not a "race riot," as the events of November 1898 came to be known, but rather a racially motivated rebellion launched by white supremacists.
In Wilmington’s Lie, Pulitzer Prize-winner David Zucchino uses contemporary newspaper accounts, diaries, letters and official communications to create a gripping and compelling narrative that weaves together individual stories of hate and fear and brutality. This is a dramatic and definitive account of a remarkable but forgotten chapter of American history. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
David Zucchino is a contributing writer for The New York Times. He has covered wars and civil conflicts in more than three dozen countries. Zucchino was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for his dispatches from apartheid South Africa and is a four-time Pulitzer Prize finalist for his reporting from Iraq, Lebanon, Africa, and inner-city Philadelphia. He is the author of Wilmington's Lie (2020) Thunder Run (2004), and Myth of the Welfare Queen. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
David Zucchino is one of the finest foreign correspondents I have ever worked with in 40 years of journalism. Now imagine you take someone with David’s reporting skills and transport him back in history to 1898 and Wilmington, North Carolina. And you tell him to tell us the story of the only violent overthrow of an elected government in American history. It was perpetrated by white supremacists seeking to reverse the remarkable advances in racial pluralism in Wilmington of that day—a positive example that was primed to spread throughout the state, and beyond. What you end up with is a gripping, cannot-put-down book that is both history and a distant mirror on just how much can go wrong in this great country of ours when populist politicians play the race card without restraint.
Thomas L. Friedman - New York Times
Brilliant…. Zucchino, a contributing writer for the New York Times, does not overwrite the scenes. His moral judgement stands at a distance. He simply describes what happened and the lies told to justify it all…. The details contained in the last part of the book are heart-wrenching. With economy and a cinematic touch, Zucchino recounts the brutal assault on black Wilmington.
Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. - New York Times Book Review
David Zucchino offers a gripping account of one of the most disturbing, though virtually unknown, political events in American history…. Thanks to Mr. Zucchino’s unflinching account, we now have the full, appalling story. As befits a serious journalist, he avoids polemics and lets events speak for themselves. Wilmington’s Lie joins a growing shelf of works that unpeel the brutal realities of the post-Civil War South…. [I]t is books such as these, not least Wilmington’s Lie, that have redeemed the truth of post-Civil War history from the tenacious mythology of racism.
Wall Street Journal
In Wilmington’s Lie, David Zucchino, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has covered conflicts around the world, punctures the myths surrounding the insurrection and provides a dynamic and detailed account of the lives of perpetrators and victims…. Deeply researched and profoundly relevant, Wilmington’s Lie explains how [the coup] happened and suggests how much work remains to be done to come to terms with what took place.
Washington Post
This is an amazing story.
Dave Davies - NPR Fresh Air
David Zucchino offers a gripping account of one of the most disturbing, though virtually unknown, political events in American history…. Thanks to Mr. Zucchino’s unflinching account, we now have the full, appalling story. As befits a serious journalist, he avoids polemics and lets events speak for themselves. Wilmington’s Lie joins a growing shelf of works that unpeel the brutal realities of the post-Civil War South…it is books such as these, not least Wilmington’s Lie, that have redeemed the truth of post-Civil War history from the tenacious mythology of racism.
Wall Street Journal
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Zucchino cuts through a century of propaganda, myth, and big white lies to unmask the stunning history of the Wilmington coup, its origins in the political climate of the era, and its far-reaching implications for North Carolina and the rest of the resurgent Confederacy in the decades that followed.
New York Journal of Books
(Starred review) [S]earing…. Drawing on a wealth of primary sources, Zucchino paints a disturbing portrait of the massacre and how it was covered up by being described as a "race riot" sparked by African-Americans.… [M]asterful.
Publishers Weekly
[A] tragic story of denied civil rights…. Even astute readers of history and civil rights will be alarmed by this story, which is why it should be read. For fans of American history, politics, and civil rights. —Keith Klang, Port Washington P.L., NY
Library Journal
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Zucchino shines his reporter's spotlight on what he aptly calls a murderous coup as well as exploring its background and longterm consequences…The result is both a page-turner and a sobering reminder of democracy's fragility.
Booklist
(Starred review) A searing and still-relevant tale of racial injustice at the turn of the 20th century.… Zucchino's narrative is clear and appropriately outraged without being strident. A book that does history a service by uncovering a shameful episode, one that resonates strongly today.
Kirkus Reviews
Pierces layers of myth and invented history…. Wilmington's Lie reconstructs the only violent overthrow of an elected government in U.S. history, tying the white supremacist bloodshed to political goals that are still relevant today.
Shelf Awareness
Wilmington’s Lie is a riveting and mesmerizing page turner, with lessons about racial violence that echo loudly today.
BookPage
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for WILMINGTON'S LIE … then take off on your own:
1. Had you known of the Wilmington massacre before reading David Zucchino's book? If so, what was your understanding of the events recounted in the book?
2. Does Wilmington's Lie challenge your view of who we are as a nation? Have we changed over the past 120+ years? How or how not?
3. Why do white people have difficulties with black peoples' self-assertion? To what extent does white anger still exist in the 21st century? What is or was the source of white anger? What about black anger?
4. Josephus Daniels, publisher of the Record, and Furnifold Simmons of the state's Democratic Party were able to exploit the anger and fears of the white population through an intentional campaign of disinformation. Is today's public as gullible as it was at the turn of the 20th century? Or, given the impact of social media, are we perhaps more so?
5. Talk about the response of the governor of North Carolina, as well as that of President William McKinley? What prevented both men from intervening?
6. Overall, what parallels, if any, does Wilmington's Lie have to today? What lessons, if any, can we learn?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)