The Man Who Cried I Am

Max Reddick, a novelist, journalist, and presidential�speechwriter, has spent his career struggling against�the riptide of race in America. Now terminally ill, he�has nothing left to lose. An expat for many years, Max�returns to Europe one last time to settle an old debt�with his estranged Dutch wife, Margrit, and to attend�the Paris funeral of his friend, rival, and mentor Harry�Ames. Among Harry's papers, Max uncovers explosive�secret government documents outlining `King Alfred', a�plan to be implemented in the event of widespread racial�unrest and aiming `to terminate, once and for all, the�Minority threat to the whole of the American society'.�Realizing that Harry has been assassinated, Max must�risk everything to get the documents to the one man who�can help. Greeted as a masterpiece when it was published�in 1967,�The Man Who Cried I Am�stakes out a range of�experience rarely seen in American fiction: from the�life of a Black GI to the ferment of postcolonial Africa�to an insider's view of Washington politics in the era of�segregation and the Civil Rights Movement. John A.�Williams and his lost classic are overdue for rediscovery.