r/news • u/FreeChickenDinner • 4d ago

West Virginia couple charged with trafficking their adopted Black children to be used as ‘slaves,’ authorities allege

https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/27/us/west-virginia-adopted-black-children-slaves-reaj/index.html
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u/cyncity7 4d ago

I’m reading a really excellent book about the Civil War. The pre-Civil War south sounds exactly like the right wing today. Not similar, exactly alike. I’m from the south and I thought I’d heard every racist thing, but I’m still amazed. “The Demon of Unrest” if anyone is interested.

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u/PlaneLocksmith6714 4d ago

I love Erik Larson

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u/panicnarwhal 4d ago

the devil in the white city was excellent

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u/cyncity7 4d ago

Have never read anything bad by him. They’re sometimes slow going, at first when he’s setting the scene, but filled with facts and he really gets the people part with diaries, letters, etc.

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u/PlaneLocksmith6714 4d ago

Pretty much. He is definitely wordy when setting a scene and I go back and reread passages a few times but his style serves a point for the story and brings you inside the world he is writing about. Some authors seem to do it to appear more interesting than they are. But it’s needed in his books, much like Frank McCourt, I love his novels and he sets the scene in a very specific and descriptive way.

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u/AnthropotamusBear 4d ago

Thank you for suggesting this — just put a hold on the book at my local library.

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u/64645 4d ago edited 4d ago

May I suggest for your next book if you haven't read it already is How The South Won The Civil War. It bridges the gap between then and now and traces why the modern right wing today sounds just like them.

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u/cyncity7 4d ago

Haven’t read it, but I will.

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u/ArgumentAlarmed9532 4d ago

Just what I'm looking for these days. Thank you

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u/angrynuggette 4d ago

That makes a lot of sense considering how they are going about making America 'great again'.

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u/panicnarwhal 4d ago

just downloaded this to my kindle, thanks for the recommendation! i loved devil in the white city, but i’ve never read any of his other books

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u/cyncity7 4d ago

I don’t recall the name, but he wrote an excellent book about pre-WWII Germany. I lived in Charleston for a while and I had a visceral response to his description of that city right before the Ft. Sumter attack. You can also see that not much has changed since then. While I’m recommending, the Grant biography by Ron Chernow is an eye opener. I gave it to my brother, hoping he’d see that slavery did not end with the Civil War. Our problems go way back, but we blew a chance to change things with failed Reconstruction. Sorry to run on, but I don’t get a lot of opportunity to discuss these things.

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u/solo954 4d ago

In the Garden of Beasts.

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u/panicnarwhal 4d ago

thank you so much for the recommendations 💕

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u/solo954 4d ago

Just bought online, thx for recommendation.