The House on Hatemonger Hill

" an engrossing tale of suspense, treachery, and bad choices made for good reasons.... Historical novel readers with special interest in a suspense story that embraces civil rights activism and gang activity will find The House on Hatemonger Hill hard to point down. - Midwest Book Review

Washington, D.C., 1964. Plain, timid Sue Millard turns femme fatale as she's pulled into a dangerous plot to rob American neo-Nazi George Lincoln Rockwell. "It's all for a good cause," she thinks as she struggles with her conscience and her fear. Robbery is a crime, but Rockwell is an angry man with evil plans. Sue and her gang of thieves donate the stolen stash to civil rights organizations to help pass the Civil Rights Bill of 1964. Their plot is perfectly planned-nothing can go wrong, but Rockwell finds out who robbed him, and Sue becomes caught in an escalating campaign of terror as she fights for her life.

The author once ran a boarding house in downtown Washington, D.C., and mined the experience in writing this book. Although she took bits of personality from the real boarders in developing the characters for this book, this is a work of fiction. None of the fictional characters bear any resemblance to anyone she met at the real boarding house.

The descriptions of George Lincoln Rockwell and the house were taken from the well-researched and reviewed book, American Fuehrer-George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party by Frederick J. Simonelli*.* Descriptions of Rockwell's men and neighborhood are entirely fictional.

The Bill of the Century: The Epic Battle for the Civil Rights Act by ClayRisen was also a helpful resource. She also used many articles on the Internet describing the times, Rockwell and the struggle for civil rights.

The international language also figures in this book. The author was an active Esperantist in the Washington area, and the boarding house also became an "Esperanto Domo." She hosted Esperantists visiting Washington from all over the world.

The passage of the Civil Rights Bill of 1964 made a huge difference in the lives of African Americans and of all women in the United States. More legal battles had to be fought but Title VII not only banned discrimination against African Americans, it also opened the door for women to gain access to jobs, credit cards and loans in their own names, join professional associations, like the National Press Club, that up until then were "men only," to enter restaurants and register at hotels without raised eyebrows and harassment, to be admitted to military academies as equals to men, and many other rights that had been denied to women.

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