"On December 31, 1972, revelers gathering in downtown New Orleans for the New Year's celebration found themselves running for cover as a sniper opened fire. The shooter targeted police officers, killing several over the following week before a final showdown on the roof of a hotel, where he was killed. Journalist Hernon's 1978 title unfurls the story of sniper Mark James Essex, a U.S. Navy veteran who declared war on white society. A solid title for true-crime collections." --Library Journal
Reader Comments:
"Unfortunately, he [Essex] identified and responded to 'white people' using the very tools of whiteness I am certain
the walls of
Essex's apartment |
he hated: the phenotypic stigma of skin color and hair texture coupled with the violence of overwhelming force."
--Bryan Wilhite
"... in the account of Mark Essex's anger, violence, and death, I'm compelled to see the fruitlessness of most idealism. Idealism is almost always frustrated, and, when frustrated but still pursued, often leads to violence."
--Mark A. Hershberger, Mark's full essay
"I just finished reading A Terrible Thunder. Great stuff. I had been looking for that book for over a decade."
--John McCarthy
On New Year's Eve in New Orleans, 1972, Mark James Essex began one of the most violent and deadly sniper attacks on policemen that any American city had ever seen.
It was yet another tragic journey down the road of hatred, and before it ended one week later, hundreds of heavily armed police and a Marine Corps assault helicopter would be called to a burning downtown hotel to battle phantom gunmen who refused to surrender or to be killed.
