Hinton, Elizabeth. (2021). America on Fire: The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s

Excerpt

The novel by Elizabeth Hinton, America on Fire, provides the reader with a difficult yet necessary lesson of Black American history. Throughout the book, Elizabeth Hinton explains in great detail how Black Americans were treated throughout the twentieth century. In the last couple of chapters, she goes into some detail about how Black Americans were treated in the twenty-first century, but the main focus of the book is the treatment of Black Americans by police and by other American citizens throughout the 1960s and 1970s. America on Fire was very well thought out and provides the reader with images of the atrocious events that occurred throughout our history. It illustrates how horrendous these times were for black people living in America and the repression people faced when trying to fight for equality. The chapters are separated very deliberately, and the book is organized in a clear manner. While there is strength in the organized chapters, the historical events blend together within each chapter and feel a bit unorganized. For example, she was talking about an uprising against the police in Sierra Vista and then abruptly switched to tell a story about a rebellion in Peoria, Illinois Taft Homes. If these two rebellions were separated by a subheading, it would provide the readers with a clear vision that there is a new uprising location and also hone in on how many rebellions there were throughout this time. Even so, Hinton’s work greatly impacted my thoughts and taught me much more about black history since the American education system fails to teach unbiased details and perspectives of black history. …