A potentially enlightening examination of the value of solidarity politics falls short.
A reassessment of interracial cooperation in the 1960s freedom movement.
Echols, a skilled writer whose previous works include Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture (2010) and Shortfall: Family Secrets, Financial Collapse, and a Hidden History of American Banking (2017), undertakes a “substantive history of the interracial and cross-racial collaborations forged by Blacks and whites in the freedom movement of the sixties.” Echols opens with a case study of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee’s shifting approach to interracial collaboration and then turns to the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. An interrogation of Tom Wolfe’s 1970 essay, “Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny’s,” follows; she labels “Radical Chic” “perhaps the most enduring piece of writing from the sixties” and identifies it as a major source of ongoing critiques of white liberalism. The book concludes with a discussion of continuing cross-racial collaborations in courtrooms even after broader coalitions had fallen out of favor in the early 1970s. Echols argues, “Even if some of the people in my book were ‘awkward allies,’ clueless ‘comrades,’ and even dilettantes, their contributions made a difference.” That may be, but the impulse to better understand, if not vindicate, those who were well-intentioned leads to problematic moments. Echols declares “unconscionable” the Weathermen’s failure to take responsibility for a 1970 bombing that many assumed to be the work of the Black Panthers. But then follows, “Of course, if Weather was hoping to encourage Black people to start the revolution, why would they reveal their identity as the bombers?” This and similar moments effectively, if inadvertently, undermine critiques of real issues in interracial and cross-racial interactions. Echols acknowledges that she offers “no simple takeaways,” but the assessment that interracial and cross-racial collaborations “were thrilling and heartbreaking, effective and fraught,” leaves the reader wanting more.
A potentially enlightening examination of the value of solidarity politics falls short.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9780197789032
Page Count: 488
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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