{"product_id":"fire-in-beulah-isbn-9780142000243","title":"Fire in Beulah","description":"\u003cb\u003e“A haunting, engrossing portrait of two families – one white, one Black – whose lives are woven together and then shattered” (\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e) by the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOil-boom opulence, fear, hate, and lynchings are the backdrop for this riveting novel about one of the worst incidents of violence in American history. Althea Whiteside, an oil-wildcatter’s high-strung white wife, and her enigmatic Black maid, Graceful, share a complex connection during the tense days of the Oklahoma oil rush. Their juxtaposing stories – and those of others close to them – unfold as tensions mount to a violent climax in the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, during which whites burned the city’s prosperous Black neighborhood to the ground. The massacre becomes the crucible that melds and tests each of the character in this masterful exploration of the American race story and the ties that bind us irrevocably to one another.\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cu\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eFire in Beulah:\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A haunting, engrossing portrait of two families – one white, one black – whose lives are woven together and then shattered . . . Askew’s final hundred pages are a cinematic, apocalyptic denouement, as all the characters are swept up in the terrible racial tidal wave.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Askew’s tinderbox of a novel is suffused with an almost unbearable tension . . . a moving, troubling story . . .  Askew nails as well as any author in recent memory the claustrophobia of racism, the devastation of hate and the way it sucks all the air out of the world.”\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eCompelling, intense and frightening . . . recalls and recreates a devastating if largely forgotten historical event in order to explore the awful consequences of human failure.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eChicago Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“A devastating story of greed, violence, and destruction . . . Askew’s novel is riveting and remarkably relevant.”\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Portland Oregonian\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eRilla Askew\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of \u003ci\u003eStrange Business\u003c\/i\u003e, a collection of stories, and of the novel \u003ci\u003eThe Mercy Seat\u003c\/i\u003e, nominated for the PEN\/Faulkner Award and the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Association Award and winner of the Western Heritage Award and the Oklahoma Book Award. Her novel about the Tulsa Race Massacre, \u003ci\u003eFire in Beulah\u003c\/i\u003e, received the American Book Award in 2002 and was chosen for Oklahoma’s statewide reading program in 2007. Other titles include the novels \u003ci\u003eHarpsong \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e Kind of Kin \u003c\/i\u003eand a collection of creative nonfiction, \u003ci\u003eMost American: Notes from a Wounded Place\u003c\/i\u003e. Askew’s essays and short fiction have appeared in \u003ci\u003eAGNI, Tin House, World Literature Today, Nimrod, Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards, \u003c\/i\u003eand elsewhere. In 2009 Askew received the Arts and Letters Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She teaches creative writing at the University of Oklahoma.","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304003850469,"sku":"NP9780142000243","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780142000243.jpg?v=1767726932","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/fire-in-beulah-isbn-9780142000243","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}