Synopses & Reviews
"First we had segregation.Then integration. Then disintegration."-- resident, American Beach
Avoiding the easy clichés of victimhood and oppression, award-winning journalist Russ Rymer brings to life the stark conflict between whites and blacks in the United States today. Through three connected lives in and around northeast Florida's black resort town of American Beach--an unarmed black motorist killed by a white policeman; the great-grandfather of Florida's first black millionaire, who lives on the beach with next to nothing; and prominent Harlem Renaissance writer Zora Neale Hurston--Rymer presents a vision of a nation where the futures of both races are as linked as their histories, where the lost record of heroic black enterprise and prominence offers a key to the struggles of every modern American.
Review
"These stories strike at the core of who we are as a nation, caught as we are in the vise grip of race, and between development and progress and our traditions and past." New York Times Book Review
Review
"Filled with moving and often terrifying stories, fascinating history and vivid portraits. [American Beach] is a model of what a serious, sustained conversation on race might be, a conversation in which the participants were willing to finger the jagged grain of race and American history, perhaps discovering in the process the future of us all." Chicago Tribune
About the Author
Russ Rymer is a journalist who has written for The New Yorker, Harper's, and the New York Times. His first book, Genie, was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award. He lives in Los Angles.