Bloomsbury, Emory University

In the aftermath of the Ferguson riots, Carol Anderson wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post arguing the nation's attention should be on the rage that had sparked them — but, she wrote, it wasn't black rage. In her 2016 book, Anderson continues her piercing analysis of white rage, and the ways in which it has fueled, and continues to fuel, political decisions which push back against the advancement of black Americans.

"Anderson’s writing is uncompromising, exactingly documented and heartfelt," Terrance MacMullan told us. "The greatest value of this work is its ability to help us see how the events like those in Charlottesville (and Ferguson, the election of Donald Trump, the War on Drugs, the Southern Strategy, and countless other racial flashpoints in our history) are not just isolated events, but are instead moments in our nation’s dreadful history of white rage. She challenges white people to see that at least as far back as Reconstruction we have failed to live up to our nation’s still-unrealized promise to treat all people as equal because we lash out in fear at any perceived threat to our power and we still do not know how to live in peace with people of color."