Home › Best of 2026 › Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground

Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground

by Zayd Ayers Dohrn

Family life in the revolutionary underground

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Awards & Recognition

  • Award recognition

    Longlisted for the 2026 National Book Award for Nonfiction

    Longlisted for the 2026 National Book Award for Nonfiction.

  • Bestseller

    An Independent Press Bestseller

    Described as an Independent Press Bestseller.

  • Editorial selection

    A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice

    Named a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice.

AlbakiReads Editorial

Family life in the revolutionary underground

Zayd Ayers Dohrn’s memoir brings together family history and the history of radical resistance in the United States. Born to parents living as fugitives, he revisits the account they gave him of leaving revolutionary struggle behind and examines what their life underground meant for the family. Drawing on interviews, declassified FBI files, and family papers and photographs, the book also addresses the Weathermen’s bombing campaign, its alliance with the Black Liberation Army, and the effects of political violence on victims, children, and those involved. The personal inquiry gives the memoir a clear focus on how family bonds and political commitment can intersect with danger.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Readers interested in memoirs shaped by family history and political activism.
  • Those seeking accounts of the Weathermen, the Black Liberation Army, and the revolutionary underground.
  • Readers interested in how political violence affects families and its participants.

Themes

Family and political commitmentRadical resistance in the United StatesPolitical violence and its consequencesMemory, secrecy, and family history

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

Zayd Ayers Dohrn was born underground. His parents were fugitives after a decade fighting the US government; his mother was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list. All his life, Dohrn's parents said his birth marked a clean break with violent revolutionary struggle, but in this explosive memoir, he discovers that story wasn't entirely true.

This masterpiece of personal and social history brings us inside an infamous family and their lives underground. Drawing on exclusive interviews, declassified FBI files, and long-hidden letters, photos, and diaries, Dohrn tells a new story of radical resistance, including revelations about the Weathermen's bombing campaign, their secret alliance with the Black Liberation Army, and the dramatic prison break of Assata Shakur.

Reckoning with the emotional damage the Weathermen inflicted on their victims, their children, and themselves, Dohrn's unflinching memoir explores the roots of radicalism and asks how a young person survives when the place they feel safest--with their family--also puts them in danger.

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