{"product_id":"american-bloodlines-reckoning-with-lynch-culture-hardcover","title":"American Bloodlines: Reckoning with Lynch Culture - Hardcover","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eSonya Lea\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSummer 1936: Rainey Bethea, a young Black man, is tried for the rape and murder of an elderly white woman. The all-white, all-male jury takes just four and a half minutes to find him guilty. Bethea is hanged near the banks of the Ohio River in Owensboro, Kentucky, with more than twenty thousand white people in attendance. The crowd turns the violent spectacle of Bethea's hanging--the last documented public execution in the United States--into a brutal carnival.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBethea's story came to author Sonya Lea through her family, and it is through her family that she reckons with its truths. At her grandmother's funeral, Lea received an oral history recorded by a neighbor. In its pages, Lea, who is descended from white Kentuckians on both sides, discovered that two of the spectators at Bethea's execution were her grandparents, teenage newlyweds Sherrel and Frances Ralph. Lea's research would also divulge that she was related to the prosecuting attorney for the Commonwealth, the man considered most responsible for Bethea's hanging.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003ci\u003eAmerican Bloodlines \u003c\/i\u003ecombines memoir with reportage and cultural criticism to interrogate and complicate the traditional narrative about how lynch culture is created in families, communities, and institutions\u003ci\u003e. \u003c\/i\u003eThe essays in this collection grapple\u003ci\u003e\u003c\/i\u003ewith our complicity in these atrocities--including the agreement in our silences--and demonstrate how we, as descendants, might take responsibility and bring new scrutiny to ancestral and communal crimes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003cb\u003eSonya Lea \u003c\/b\u003eis the author of the memoir \u003ci\u003eWondering Who You Are\u003c\/i\u003e, which garnered praise from \u003ci\u003eOprah Magazine, People\u003c\/i\u003e, and the BBC. She teaches at workshops and creates writing retreats in the US and Canada. Her essays have appeared in \u003ci\u003eSalon, Southern Review, Guernica, Los Angeles Review of Books, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eMs. \u003c\/i\u003emagazine, among others.\u003c\/p\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 200\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 0.9 x 9.1 x 5.7 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e October 07, 2025\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"Books by splitShops","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51887776891168,"sku":"9781985902855","price":32.35,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0974\/9764\/5344\/files\/GeelHQsfzT9781985902855.webp?v=1781905799","url":"https:\/\/ebocreations.com\/products\/american-bloodlines-reckoning-with-lynch-culture-hardcover","provider":"The E-Book Oasis LLC","version":"1.0","type":"link"}