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A review by alexijai98
A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them by Timothy Egan
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
“The Grand Dragon was a symptom, not a cause, of an age that has been mischaracterized as one of Gatsby frivolity and the mayhem of modernism.”
This is probably my favorite nonfiction read of 2023. I’ve read quite a few books and articles on the Klan, and as a black woman and history educator I know the importance of teaching the reality of the KKK’s reach. The Klan did not invent white supremacy, they honed it into political action, as Egan so deftly explains.
This work is valuable on so many levels, one of which is Egan’s determination to not relegate the Klan to the geographic bounds of the South. The Klan was nationwide, as was and is white supremacy. You can see the extent of its clutches throughout A Fever in the Heartland. Egan’s work is a reminder that progress has been made, but work is still to be done.
This is probably my favorite nonfiction read of 2023. I’ve read quite a few books and articles on the Klan, and as a black woman and history educator I know the importance of teaching the reality of the KKK’s reach. The Klan did not invent white supremacy, they honed it into political action, as Egan so deftly explains.
This work is valuable on so many levels, one of which is Egan’s determination to not relegate the Klan to the geographic bounds of the South. The Klan was nationwide, as was and is white supremacy. You can see the extent of its clutches throughout A Fever in the Heartland. Egan’s work is a reminder that progress has been made, but work is still to be done.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide attempt, Suicide, Blood, Death, Domestic abuse, Grief, Religious bigotry, Gaslighting, Hate crime, Kidnapping, Misogyny, Police brutality, Racial slurs, Torture, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Murder, Racism, Rape, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, and Xenophobia