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TRUEVINE

Beth Macy

Two Brothers, A Kidnapping, and a Mother's Quest: A True Story of the Jim Crow South

TRUEVINE is the true story of two African-American brothers who were kidnapped and displayed as circus freaks, and whose mother endured a 28-year struggle to get them back. “Macy’s exploration of the long-hidden fate of two young African Americans and how that fate illuminates the atrocities of the Jim Crow South is as compelling as Rebecca Skloot’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks…both are absolutely stunning examples of narrative nonfiction at its best…Certain to be among the most memorable books of the year.” — Connie Fletcher
The year was 1899 and the place a sweltering tobacco farm in the Jim Crow South town of Truevine, Virginia. George and Willie Muse were two little boys born to a sharecropper family. One day a white man offered them a piece of candy, setting off events that would take them around the world and change their lives forever. Captured into the circus, the Muse brothers performed for royalty at Buckingham Palace and headlined over a dozen sold-out shows at New York's Madison Square Garden. They were global superstars in a pre-broadcast era. But the very root of their success was in the color of their skin and in the outrageous caricatures they were forced to assume: supposed cannibals, sheep-headed freaks, even "Ambassadors from Mars." Back home, their mother never accepted that they were "gone" and spent 28 years trying to get them back. Through hundreds of interviews and decades of research, Beth Macy expertly explores a central and difficult question: Where were the brothers better off? On the world stage as stars or in poverty at home? TRUEVINE is a compelling narrative rich in historical detail and rife with implications to race relations today. Beth Macy is a New York Times bestselling author and a journalist who writes about outsiders and underdogs. Her writing has won more than a dozen national journalism awards, including a Nieman Fellowship for Journalism at Harvard and the 2013 J. Anthony Lukas Word-in-Progress award for FACTORY MAN, published by Little, Brown and Company in July 2014.
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Published 2016-10-01 by Little Brown

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UK: Macmillan ; Spain: Santillana Ediciones

Charles Murray has been hired to adapt the bestselling book "Truevine" by Beth Macy for Paramount Pictures, sources tell Variety. Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Davidson's Appian Way banner is producing. Read more...

Taking us into the dark corners of American history that are discussed only in whispers, Beth Macy shines a bright light on the racial profiteering of circus freak shows and the Jim Crow South. In the remarkable TRUEVINE, Macy manages to do what all the exploitative showmen wouldn’t dare; she humanizes the Muse brothers, and in doing so, she has written an unforgettable story of both heartbreak and enduring love.

This first-rate journey into human trafficking, slavery, and familial bonding is an engrossing example of spirited, determined reportage.” Kirkus Reviews

It’s the best story in town,’ a colleague told Beth Macy decades ago, ‘but no one has been able to get it.’ She now has, with tenacity and sensitivity. She gives a singular sideshow its due, offering these ‘Ambassadors from Mars’ a remarkable, deeply affecting afterlife.

BEA Show Daily delves into the story behind Beth Macy’s TRUEVINE Read more...

This compelling account of one family’s tragic exploitation provides an important lens through which America’s tortured racial history and the cruel legacy of Jim Crow can be seen anew.

“Macy’s exploration of the long-hidden fate of two young African Americans and how that fate illuminates the atrocities of the Jim Crow South is as compelling as Rebecca Skloot’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks…both are absolutely stunning examples of narrative nonfiction at its best…Certain to be among the most memorable books of the year.”

Beth Macy has a way of getting under the skin of American life, burrowing into the seemingly ordinary to find the weird and wonderful taproots of our society.

Entertainment Weekly included TRUEVINE in their article “11 best things we saw at BookExpo America 2016.” Read more...

A cover story from Publishers Weekly Show Daily calls out TRUEVINE as one of the most anticipated books of the fall. Read more...

The Dallas Morning News is also a fan of TRUEVINE - naming it as one of the most interesting books at the BEA16. Read more...