Comprehensive, riveting reportage on the enduring fight against domestic terrorism and racial violence.
How an ordinary American citizen thwarted the sinister plot of a homegrown militant hate group at the dawn of the Trump era.
Investigative journalist Lehr tells the story of Dan Day, a lifelong Kansan family man and unemployed former probation officer who, in 2015, infiltrated a local militia group as their “intelligence officer” while reporting their conspiracy plots to the FBI. In the wake of the Pulse nightclub massacre in Orlando, perpetrated by a young man who claimed allegiance to the Islamic State group, a tightly knit terrorist militia group calling itself the Kansas Security Force sought retaliation against the concentrated Somali Muslim population of Garden City. They planned to bomb an apartment building and a mosque. Using sworn testimonies, federal court documents, and more than 100 hours of Day’s hidden audio and video camera recordings, Lehr chronicles the entire ordeal with seamless ease, studding the narrative with numerous moments of taut true-crime tension. Day was fully immersed in KSF, gaining the trust of the three key “Crusaders”—Patrick Stein, Curtis Allen, and Gavin Wright—and he introduced them to “Brian,” an undercover FBI agent posing as an arms dealer. The author expertly captures these moments with vivid imagery and often frightening detail, and he clearly shows the true criminal nature of the terrorist mindset and how conspiracy plots are hatched and developed. He also profiles the lives of Somali citizens in Garden City, the refugee experience, and how that community thrives despite the ever present fear of racist violence. Lehr is a seasoned journalist whose distinguished career includes crisply probed accounts of organized crime bosses and police brutality coverups. In this report, his lucid investigative prowess once again creates a dramatic tapestry of hate, hope, and justice. He also offers a cautionary reminder about the pervasive presence of political extremism in America.
Comprehensive, riveting reportage on the enduring fight against domestic terrorism and racial violence.Pub Date: Nov. 9, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-358-35990-6
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Mariner Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2021
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 dauntless, moving account of a kidnapping and the horrors that followed.
Enduring the unthinkable.
This memoir—the first by an Israeli taken captive by Hamas on October 7, 2023—chronicles the 491 days the author was held in Gaza. Confined to tunnels beneath war-ravaged streets, Sharabi was beaten, humiliated, and underfed. When he was finally released in February, he learned that Hamas had murdered his wife and two daughters. In the face of scarcely imaginable loss, Sharabi has crafted a potent record of his will to survive. The author’s ordeal began when Hamas fighters dragged him from his home, in a kibbutz near Gaza. Alongside others, he was held for months at a time in filthy subterranean spaces. He catalogs sensory assaults with novelistic specificity. Iron shackles grip his ankles. Broken toilets produce an “unbearable stink,” and “tiny white worms” swarm his toothbrush. He gets one meal a day, his “belly caving inward.” Desperate for more food, he stages a fainting episode, using a shaving razor to “slice a deep gash into my eyebrow.” Captors share their sweets while celebrating an Iranian missile attack on Israel. He and other hostages sneak fleeting pleasures, finding and downing an orange soda before a guard can seize it. Several times, Sharabi—51 when he was kidnapped—gives bracing pep talks to younger compatriots. The captives learn to control what they can, trading family stories and “lift[ing] water bottles like dumbbells.” Remarkably, there’s some levity. He and fellow hostages nickname one Hamas guard “the Triangle” because he’s shaped like a SpongeBob SquarePants character. The book’s closing scenes, in which Sharabi tries to console other hostages’ families while learning the worst about his own, are heartbreaking. His captors “are still human beings,” writes Sharabi, bravely modeling the forbearance that our leaders often lack.
A dauntless, moving account of a kidnapping and the horrors that followed.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780063489790
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Harper Influence/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
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