A Marked Man: The Assassination of Malcolm X by Matt Doeden (review)

"'I'll never get old. . . . You'll find that very few people who think like I think live long enough to get old.'" Although any civil rights activist from the 1960s could have made a similarly prophetic claim, Malcolm X had good reason to believe that he'd meet an early demise. Here Doeden traces what Malcolm X regarded as the path to the inevitable, from Malcolm's unsettled youth in foster care, through his disillusioned period of crime and incarceration, to his conversion to Islam as interpreted and practiced by the Nation of Islam. Although he was radicalized and committed to wresting power from the white establishment by "any means necessary," his falling out with the Nation of Islam and his disdain for the nonviolence of mainstream civil rights leadership left him marginalized and surrounded by potential enemies—black and white, quasi-religious and political. The brevity of this title allows for little more than an outline of the complex shifts in Malcolm X's philosophy, but Doeden lays out the immediate circumstances surrounding the actual assassination with admirable clarity. He also presents alternative explanations of who might have actually ordered the hit and possible co-conspirators. An intervening chapter on slavery and civil rights seems unnecessary for most readers and unfortunately breaks the otherwise strong narrative flow of the text, and a glitch in the diagram of the Audubon Ballroom assassination scene conflicts with the main text as to the relative timing of the smoke bomb and the triple shooting. Despite these missteps, the importance of the subject and the tight focus on the much-debated murder conspiracy will make this a good choice for teen readers seeking material that's short, substantial, and horrifyingly true. A timeline, glossary, list of resources, index, and section of brief biographies are included.