The Queen: The Forgotten life behind an American Myth

On the South Side of Chicago in 1974, Linda Taylor reported a phony burglary, concocting a lie about stolen furs and jewelry. The detective who checked it out soon discovered she was a welfare cheat who drove a Cadillac to collect ill-gotten government checks. And that was just the beginning: Taylor, it turned out, was also a kidnapper, possibly a murderer. But nobody - not the journalists who touted her story, not the police, and not presidential candidate Ronald Reagan- seemed to care about anything but her welfare thievery.  Growing up in Jim Crow South, Taylor was made an outcast because of the color of her skin. As she rose to infamy, the press and politicians manipulated her image to demonize poor black women. Josh Levin's mesmerizing book, at once masterful social history and riveting true crime investigations, explores American racism as it dissects the "welfare queen" myth, what has fueled political debate that reverberate today.