Burden: A Preacher, a Klansman and a True Story of Redemption in the Modern South - Hardcover

Hargrave, Courtney

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1408892618 ISBN 13: 9781408892619

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2018

Synopsis

A harrowing true story of the modern Ku Klux Klan and an act of grace that shook a community in the Deep South.

The true events that inspired the film, with a foreword by writer/director Andrew Heckler

In 1996, the town of Laurens, South Carolina, was thrust into the international spotlight when a white supremacist named Michael Burden opened a museum celebrating the Ku Klux Klan on the community's main square. Journalists and protestors flooded the town and hate groups rallied to the establishment's defence, dredging up the long history of racial violence in this formerly prosperous mill town.

Shortly after his museum opened, Michael Burden abruptly left the Klan at the urging of a woman he fell in love with. Broke and homeless, he was taken in by Reverend David Kennedy, an African American preacher and leader in the Laurens community, who plunged his church headlong into a quest to save their former enemy.

In this spellbinding Southern epic, journalist Courtney Hargrave further uncovers the complex events behind the story told in Andrew Heckler's film, Burden, which won the 2018 Sundance Audience Award. Hargrave explores the choices that led to Kennedy and Burden's friendship, the social factors that drive young men to join hate groups, the intersection of poverty and racism in the divided South and the difference one person can make in confronting America's oldest sin.

About this title

Review:

A crucial story for these times (Robin Gaby Fisher, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author)

By digging deep and exhaustingly researching one small relationship in one small South Carolina town, Courtney Hargrave uncovers the big truths that usually elude us. This is an honest, empowering, incredibly enjoyable and unforgettable book (Bret Witter, New York Times bestselling co-author of 'The Monuments Men' and 'Dewey')

Courtney Hargrave has produced a mesmerizing narrative with a powerful social and political message. This is a book for our times (Bart D. Ehrman, bestselling author of 'The Triumph of Christianity')

Book Description:

A harrowing true story of the modern Ku Klux Klan and an act of grace that shook a community in the Deep South

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Publication date: 2018
• ISBN 10: 1408892618
• ISBN 13: 9781408892619
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 240