A Time to Die, by Tom Wicker (HC, 1975, $2)
"What Tom Wicker has learned, seen, and felt is Attica in September 1971. The prisoners of that upstate New York fortress have revolted, taken hostages, and have forced the authorities into four days of desperate negotiations- an impasse ultimately resolved by a police attack that takes the lives of 43 inmates and hostages."
40 years later and the debate about what went on then still goes on. This book, published 4 years after the riot, tells the story through the eyes of an associate NY Times editor. He was ordered by the inmates to come to Attica to be an "observer", and to mediate between the inmates and the authorities. He is a white man raised in the south. The authorities are white.The inmates are angry blacks. To his surprise he finds he is respecting the inmates, and questioning his upbringing, his racism, and the racism of America. His life will never be the same again. You can find this book on the new non-fiction table, and if not there, in the general non-fiction section. (Avail. 10/19)
