Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul

Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul - Paperback

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Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul
  • Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul
Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul - Paperback

Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul - Paperback

by James McBride
$21.00
$21.00

Book Overview

"You won't leave this hypnotic book without feeling that James Brown is still out there, howling."--The Boston Globe

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Good Lord Bird, winner of the 2013 National Book Award for Fiction, Deacon King Kong, and Five-Carat Soul

Kill 'Em and Leave is more than a book about James Brown. Brown embodied the contradictions of American life: He was an unsettling symbol of the tensions between North and South, black and white, rich and poor. After receiving a tip that promises to uncover the man behind the myth, James McBride goes in search of the "real" James Brown. McBride's travels take him to forgotten corners of Brown's never-before-revealed history, illuminating not only our understanding of the immensely troubled, misunderstood, and complicated Godfather of Soul, but the ways in which our cultural heritage has been shaped by Brown's enduring legacy.

Praise for Kill 'Em and Leave

"A tour de force of cultural reportage."--The Seattle Times

"Thoughtful and probing."--The New York Times Book Review

"Masterly . . . powerful."--Los Angeles Review of Books

"McBride provides something lacking in most of the books about James Brown: an intimate feeling for the musician, a veracious if inchoate sense of what it was like to be touched by him. . . . It may be as close [to 'the real James Brown'] as we'll ever get."--David Hajdu, The Nation

"A feat of intrepid journalistic fortitude."--USA Today

"[McBride is] the biographer of James Brown we've all been waiting for. . . . McBride's true subject is race and poverty in a country that doesn't want to hear about it, unless compelled by a voice that demands to be heard."--Boris Kachka, New York

"Illuminating . . . engaging."--The Washington Post

"A gorgeously written piece of reportage that gives us glimpses of Brown's genius and contradictions."--O: The Oprah Magazine
ISBN9780812983739
Author James McBride
PublisherRandom House Publishing Group
GenreBiography
FormatPaperback
PublishedNovember 2016
LanguageENG- English
Pages256
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Biography & Autobiography Music Nonfiction

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More by James McBride

Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul

Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul - Paperback

Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul - Paperback

By James McBride

About James McBride

James McBride is the author of the New York Times-bestselling novel The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, the Oprah's Book Club selection Deacon King Kong, the National Book Award-winning The Good Lord Bird, the American classic The Color of Water, the novels Song Yet Sung and Miracle at St. Anna, the story collection Five-Carat Soul, and Kill 'Em and Leave, a biography of James Brown. The recipient of a National Humanities Medal and an accomplished musician, McBride is also a distinguished writer in residence at New York University.

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