Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years 1963-65

Trevor Coleman Detroit Free Press The strength of Pillar of Fire lies in Branch's unsurpassed ability to bring the reader into the moment, enabling one to almost feel the tension of the times. Bill Maxwell St. Petersburg Times Pillar of Fire, a history of symbiosis and epiphany, records King's vision and the disparate moral currents that forced America to redefine itslef in light of its failures to live up to its own principles of freedom. Ray Jenkins The Baltimore Sun Branch has an uncanny ability to penetrate the most obscure nooks and crannies of the past to provide a whole new perpective on the Sixties... Scott Ellsworth The Oregonian Magnificent...the birth of a masterwork akin to Carl Sandburg's Lincoln or Shelby Foote's Civil War. Alan Wolfe The New York Times Book Review As he did in Parting the Waters, Branch brings to these events both a passion for their detail and a recognition of their larger historical significance. Jon Meacham Newsweek Pillar of Fire is a magisterial history of one of the most tumultuous periods in postwar America. Branch's storytelling is strong, his storytelling colorful. Reading Branch, it is easier to see why even the most remarkable revolutions are never complete. David M. Shribman The Wall Street Journal One part biography, one part history, one part elegy...a vast panorama...powerful. Jeff Shesol The Washington Post Politics and personalities, ambition and imagination, triumph and tragedy. James Goodman The Boston Globe This is jet-propelled history. Richard Bernstein The New York Times By the time you have finished [Pillar of Fire], you feel almost as if you have relieved the era, not just read about it.

In the second volume of the three-part history, a monumental trilogy that began with PARTING THE WATERS, winner of the Pulitzer Prize Taylor Branch portrays the Civil Rights Movement at its zenith, recounting the climactic struggles as they commanded the national stage. Beginning where PARTING THE WATERS left off with the death of JFK, PILLAR OF FIRE recounts the rise of the movement that stirred from Southern black churches to challenge the national conscience. PILLAR OF FIRE covers the far-flung upheavals of the years 1963-1965, including Dallas, St. Augustine, Mississippi Freedom Summer, LBJ's Great Society and the Civil Rights Act of 1963, Vietnam and Selma. Taylor provides a frank portrait of Martin Luther King, Jr. revealing him to be haunted by blackmail, factionalism, and hatred while he tried to hold the non-violent movement together as a dramatic force in history. Allies, rivals, and opponents addressed racial issues that went deeper than fair treatment at bus stops or lunch counters. Participants on all sides stretched themselves and their country to the breaking point over the meaning of simple words: dignity, equal votes, equal souls.