Will I love Bearing the Cross?

Garrow’s Pulitzer-prize winning biography is the first complete, almost minute-by-minute, account of King’s life based on extensive research in the King documents, interviews with dozens of his associates, and a deep understanding of American history in that period. Garrow picks up the story just as King comes to Montgomery, and there are other books to read about the young King before 1954, but from there forward, Garrow’s is the indispensable account, and was the first book to really delve into the FBI’s surveillance of King.

Because of the extensive personal interviews with those closest to Martin Luther King, I too started affectionately calling him “Doc” halfway through this Pulitzer-Prize-winning biography. This definitive work was my first (and favorite) entry into understanding one of the most important figures of the twentieth century. Garrow’s unquestioned accuracy, measured storytelling, and quick pacing bring to life all the big events and accomplices in King’s world. Only this biography pulls me right into the strained moments we all know such leaders endure during meaningful lives.