"...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. Does that justify the robbery? The plot is perfectly planned-nothing can go wrong, but then Rockwell finds out who robbed him. Sue is caught in the middle of an escalating campaign of terror as she battless for her life and Rockwell struggles to retrieve his money.
The author once ran a boarding house on Kilbourne Place in downtown Washington, D.C. and mined the experience in writing this book. Although bits of personality from the real boarders were used in developing the characters for this book, this is a work of fiction. None of the fictional characters bear any resemblance to anyone 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 Clay Risen was also a helpful resource.
The author was an active Esperantist in the Washington area. Her boarding house became an "Esperanto Domo," hosting 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.
