“A real-life racially motivated mass killing from 1946 is boldly and deeply reimagined [in this] incisive, gripping and empathetic novel” (Kirkus, starred review). Inspired by true events, The Vain Conversation reflects on the 1946 lynching of two black couples in Georgia from the perspectives of three characters—Bertrand Johnson, one of the victims; Noland Jacks, a presumed perpetrator; and Lonnie Henson, a witness to the murders as a ten-year-old boy. Lonnie’s inexplicable feelings of culpability drive him in a search for meaning that takes him around the world, and ultimately back to Georgia, where he must confront both Jacks and his own demons. In this stirring and incisive narrative, Anthony Grooms seeks to advance the national dialogue on race relations. With complexity, satire, and surprising moments of levity, he explores what it means to redeem and be redeemed. Deeply probing the issues of American race violence, The Vain Conversation also speaks to the broader issues of oppression and violence everywhere. Foreword by poet, painter, and novelist Clarence Major. Afterward by bestselling author T. Geronimo Johnson.

In his barracks, Walter Burke is trying to write a letter to the parents of a fallen soldier, an Alabama man who died in a muddy rice paddy. But all he can think of is his childhood friend Lamar, the friend with whom he first experienced the fury of violence, on the streets of Birmingham, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement. The juxtaposition is so powerful—between war-torn Vietnam and terror-filled “Bombingham”—that he is drawn back to the summer that would see his transition from childish wonder at the world to his certain knowledge of his place in it. Walter and Lamar were always aware of the terms of segregation—the horrendous rules and stifling reality. Their paper route never took them to the white areas of town. But that year, everything exploded. And so did Walter’s family. As the great movement swelled around them, the Burkes faced tremendous obstacles of their own. From a tortured past lingered questions of faith, and a terrible family crisis found its climax as the city did the same. In the streets of Birmingham, ordinary citizens risked their lives to change America. And for Walter, the war was just beginning.

Second Edition of Anthony Groom's award-winning collection of short stories, Trouble No More, set throughout the American South, presents stories that engage with history, politics, class, race, childhood, and life. They are the personal and public troubles of the African American middle class. These stories are about families, intact and estranged, about ordinary lives in extraordinary times.

A engrossing novel based on the true story of the 1946 lynching of two black couples in Georgia

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER In an era of safe spaces, trigger warnings, and an unprecedented election, the country's youth are in crisis. Senator Ben Sasse warns the nation about the existential threat to America's future. Raised by well-meaning but overprotective parents and coddled by well-meaning but misbegotten government programs, America's youth are ill-equipped to survive in our highly-competitive global economy. Many of the coming-of-age rituals that have defined the American experience since the Founding: learning the value of working with your hands, leaving home to start a family, becoming economically self-reliant—are being delayed or skipped altogether. The statistics are daunting: 30% of college students drop out after the first year, and only 4 in 10 graduate. One in three 18-to-34 year-olds live with their parents. From these disparate phenomena: Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse who as president of a Midwestern college observed the trials of this generation up close, sees an existential threat to the American way of life. In The Vanishing American Adult, Sasse diagnoses the causes of a generation that can't grow up and offers a path for raising children to become active and engaged citizens. He identifies core formative experiences that all young people should pursue: hard work to appreciate the benefits of labor, travel to understand deprivation and want, the power of reading, the importance of nurturing your body—and explains how parents can encourage them. Our democracy depends on responsible, contributing adults to function properly—without them America falls prey to populist demagogues. A call to arms, The Vanishing American Adult will ignite a much-needed debate about the link between the way we're raising our children and the future of our country.

The lynching of two couples in 1946 Georgia told by three characters who experience it: Victim, Bertrand Johnson, witness, ten-year-old Lonnie Henson and presumed killer, Noland Jacks.

Chicago, 1941. A blood bank is held up in a robbery, but no cash is taken—only blood. It's the latest in a string of similar robberies and as the United States prepares to enter World War II, FBI Agent Felix Franklin is certain it's part of a wider plot to weaken the United States by depriving it of its blood supply. But the truth is much more sinister. The four robbers are vampires: immortal, physically powerful, and after decades of honing their skills, practically untraceable. But time goes on and the vampires—who call themselves The Vain—stay the same in a world that is rapidly changing around them. As security measures evolve, stealing blood is harder every day. And with every decade that passes, Agent Franklin gets closer to finding them. Capturing them. Ending them.