Beneath a Ruthless Sun: A True Story of Violence, Race, and Justice Lost and Found
Written by Gilbert King
Narrated by Kimberly Farr
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this audiobook
From the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning bestseller Devil in the Grove, the gripping true story of a small town with a big secret.
In December 1957, the wife of a Florida citrus baron is raped in her home while her husband is away. She claims a "husky Negro" did it, and the sheriff, the infamous racist Willis McCall, does not hesitate to round up a herd of suspects. But within days, McCall turns his sights on Jesse Daniels, a gentle, mentally impaired white nineteen-year-old. Soon Jesse is railroaded up to the state hospital for the insane, and locked away without trial.
But crusading journalist Mabel Norris Reese cannot stop fretting over the case and its baffling outcome. Who was protecting whom, or what? She pursues the story for years, chasing down leads, hitting dead ends, winning unlikely allies. Bit by bit, the unspeakable truths behind a conspiracy that shocked a community into silence begin to surface.
Beneath a Ruthless Sun tells a powerful, page-turning story rooted in the fears that rippled through the South as integration began to take hold, sparking a surge of virulent racism that savaged the vulnerable, debased the powerful, and roils our own times still.
Editor's Note
New release…
From a Pulitzer Prize–winning historian comes a new book about America’s past. A story of rape, race, and a baffling conspiracy against justice, this book shines a light on a dark moment in history.
Gilbert King
Gilbert King has written about U.S. Supreme Court history for the New York Times and the Washington Post, and is a featured contributor to Smithsonian magazine's history blog, Past Imperfect. He is the author of The Execution of Willie Francis: Race, Murder, and the Search for Justice in the American South. He lives in New York City with his wife and two daughters.
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Reviews for Beneath a Ruthless Sun
38 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5In December 1957, Blanche Knowles, the wife of a wealthy citrus baron, was raped in her home while her husband was away for the night. Although she initially said that she had been raped by an African American, a developmentally disabled young white man, Jesse Daniels, was arrested for the crime, and spent over fourteen years of his life in a Florida state institution, where he received no trial and no treatment. King does an admirable job of bringing the Florida of this time period to life. It was scary how just a few powerful men (Joe Knowles, Sheriff Willis McCall, and attorney Gordon Oldham, to name some) controlled an entire county. McCall, especially, was pretty much given near absolute free rein to run the county as he saw fit, and he murdered multiple suspects while in custody simply because he could. Again and again, McCall's racism, denial of civil rights, and murders were brought to officials' attention, but he had gained so much insulation from his friends that he was virtually untouchable. He was never convicted of murder, even though he clearly killed numerous people in cold blood.The story is convoluted, and it's almost hard to believe that this could happen in America (although it obviously did). It later is discovered that Knowles and his father-in-law didn't want it to come out that Blanche had been "soiled" by an African American, so even though McCall wanted to railroad a black man to the electric chair - but NOT the black man who likely committed the crime and even confessed to doing so - he changed his tune quickly and went after Jesse Daniels. Daniels, who was dirt poor and had been left developmentally delayed by childhood battles with rheumatic fever, was left to take the fall for a crime that he clearly did not have the mental capacity or inclination to commit.The last few chapters are particularly full of twists. In an effort to shore up his weak case, McCall arranged for the man who most likely committed the crime, Sam Wiley Odom, to CONFESS to the crime...and then had Odom sign the confession as Jesse Daniels. This only comes out many years later, and the notary public who took the confession was absolutely SHOCKED when she learned that Jesse Daniels was a white man, because it was a black man who confessed to the crime, provided details that only someone in the house could have provided, and signed that confession.And then McCall let a confessed rapist free to rape again - and he did - just to spare Joe Knowles' delicate sensibilities.Or...was that the reason he let Odom go? Because Odom claimed that someone had offered to pay him $5000 to kill Blanche Knowles, and that someone just might be Joe Knowles, who was carrying on an affair with another woman - a woman he had helped move to Florida. In fact, he was conveniently spending the night with that woman when Blanche was raped in their home. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not. There's not enough evidence to say, and Odom was electrocuted for that other rape before he spilled everything that he knew. Also a coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not.This is an absolutely SHOCKING miscarriage of justice in so many ways. So why did I only give this book three stars? Well, I think that King needed an editor for this book who wasn't afraid to trim the fat. King goes down so many rabbit trails in this book that it gets confusing. There are entire passages, sometimes even entire chapters, dedicated to things that are only peripherally related to the case, if at all. Although interesting, do I really need to have a biography of Mabel Norris Chesley (the "newspaper woman" who wouldn't let Jesse Daniels' case go)? Or a chapter dedicated to Martin Luther King's attempts to desegregate St. Augustine (with the only link to Daniels' case being that the same journalist interviewed King a few times)? Or about a man's attempt to integrate the University of Florida Law School? Or the marital woes of the Lake County Sheriff's Department? I feel that the book should have focused more on Jesse Daniels, but he takes a backseat in his own story. The book tries to be everything all at once, and in the end, it feels disjointed and rudderless. I would have enjoyed the book much more after a thorough editing had pared down the unnecessary tangents.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The author has clearly done a buttload of research and, irritatingly, his determination to include all of it interferes with the narrative; I suspect many will give up on the book in frustration. But about halfway through, it becomes quite engaging and the story really starts to flow. Unfortunately, being non-fiction, its a truly depressing tale, full of nasty men who wield power cruelly and never get punished for being such thorough assholes. A worthy read but full of weltschmerz and reasons for outrage.
I recieved a free copy of this book from some publisher for review.