Kent State: Four Dead in Ohio

2021 Eisner Award Winner

A 2021 ALA/YALSA Alex Award Winner for Teen Readers and Adult Books

NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2020 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES * FORBES * NPR * PUBLISHERS WEEKLY * LIBRARY JOURNAL

From Derf Backderf, the bestselling author of My Friend Dahmer, comes the tragic and unforgettable story of the Kent State shootings​

On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard gunned down unarmed college students protesting the Vietnam War at Kent State University. In a deadly barrage of 67 shots, 4 students were killed and 9 shot and wounded. It was the day America turned guns on its own children--a shocking event burned into our national memory. A few days prior, 10-year-old Derf Backderf saw those same Guardsmen patrolling his nearby hometown, sent in by the governor to crush a trucker strike. Using the journalism skills he employed on My Friend Dahmer and Trashed, Backderf has conducted extensive interviews and research to explore the lives of these four young people and the events of those four days in May, when the country seemed on the brink of tearing apart. Kent State: Four Dead in Ohio, which will be published in time for the 50th anniversary of the tragedy, is a moving and troubling story about the bitter price of dissent--as relevant today as it was in 1970.


Author: Derf Backderf
Publisher: Harry N. Abrams
Published: 09/08/2020
Pages: 288
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 2.60lbs
Size: 10.30h x 7.10w x 1.50d
ISBN: 9781419734847

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 12/09/2019
Library Journal 02/01/2020 pg. 74
School Library Journal 03/01/2020 pg. 134
Booklist 03/15/2020 pg. 46
Kirkus Reviews 10/15/2020

About the Author
Derf Backderf is the bestselling, award-winning author of My Friend Dahmer and Trashed. He lives in Cleveland, Ohio.