Natalie Y. Moore is an author and a journalist who reports on issues of race and community for Chicago Public Radio. Her work has appeared in publications such as Bitch, Black Enterprise, the Chicago Reporter, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Chicago Tribune, Essence, and In These Times. She is coauthor of Deconstructing Tyrone: A New Look at Black Masculinity in the Hip-Hop Generation. Lance Williams is an educator, an inner-city youth advocate and activist, and the son of a former Vice Lords member. He is a founder and a chairman of the board of the Know Thyself Program, a community-based organization providing cultural- and social-enrichment programs for youth in schools; a principal investigator of CeaseFire, an antiviolence initiative in Chicago; a board member of the Diversifying Higher Education Faculty in Illinois program; and a member of the executive committee of the Governor's Statewide Community Safety and Reentry Working Group. They both live in Chicago.
""Moore and Williams demystify the gang--and bring out the quirks of charismatic founder Jeff Fort--in this well-researched book that digs out the truth, finds the humanity in urban legend and shows how church, state and community together created the most powerful, and contradictory, of street organizations."" -- Ebony (April 2011) ""A rigorous mixture of scholarship and journalism that is rendered with a contextual empathy that's rare in other literature on street gangs."" --Salim Muwakkil, senior editor, In These Times , and host of The Salim Muwakkil Show , WVON, Chicago ""A provocative tale."" -- Chicago Citizen ""Filled with amazing and little known details and framed within Chicago African American history. The best and most accurate book on a contemporary Chicago gang ever written."" --John Hagedorn, author, People & Folks: Gangs, Crime, and the Underclass in a Rustbelt City ""A stunning book."" -- StreetWise (March 2, 2011) ""A must-read for anyone interested in the history of Chicago."" -- Chicago Crusader ""A powerful expose of disturbing realities underlying enduringly misunderstood urban legends."" -- Kirkus Reviews ""A valuable addition to a serious library about crime, shedding light on the overlooked world of black Chicago gangs."" -- Foxhill Review