Madigan provides a riveting account of one of the most shameful episodes in the troubled history of race relations in the U.S. On June 1, 1921, a mob of angry white citizens descended on Greenwood, the prosperous black quarter of Tulsa, Oklahoma, burning the thriving community and torturing and killing African American residents. Assigned to do a newspaper piece on the curiously overlooked incident nearly 80 years later, the author, a self-described "ignorant white boy," expanded his story into a stunning book chronicling Tulsa's "terrible secret." Utilizing firsthand accounts from both African American survivors and white witnesses, he has pieced together the events precipitating the riot as well as the senseless and brutal horror of the actual massacre. This cultural and sociological dissection of a twentieth-century tragedy makes difficult but compelling reading. —Margaret Flanagan
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