Hinton's work is transformative historiography. Her first book filled in a gap about our understanding of later civil rights history that we had been needing for a long time. When I saw she was producing research on urban "riots" I also thought the same thing. Something that is tossed around so much but there is not a whole lot of work about it.

This book makes a simple argument that is fleshed out and detailed through some great writing. The urban riots should best be described as rebellions. I won't say much about her specific argument, because you should read the book instead.

She begins with earlier examples and ends with the Los Angeles riots after Rodney King. I grew up in Peoria, Illinois and was very much aware of the image that Taft Homes had in society throughout the eighties and nineties; it was interesting reading about some history that I had never known, and how Hinton argues that it was part of a larger trend in the late 1960s.

The strength of her book is that she focuses a lot on individuals and examples that, for the most part, have eluded our national memory. I've never heard anything about Taft homes, nor of Cairo, in other historical narratives. To me, this reflects the power of the dominant narrative, written by those in positions of academic authority, but I can't say for certain.

The only drawback to the book is the chapter on Los Angeles, where she focused on the interactions between Crips and Bloods. It was thought-provoking and informative, but I wish more focus could have been placed on the rebellion itself and the arguments within the black community surrounding the acts of rebellion. This was the largest rebellion before Ferguson; I would have liked to see how the thought process over rebelling changed and didn't change within the African American community.

From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime, Hinton's first book, still remains on my short-list of great recent histories. This one comes close. I hope it will start a conversation and start more writing about these events