Chasing King’s Killer explores how Martin Luther King’s life and assassination affected the United States. Swanson describes the important civil rights work that King did, the legacy he left behind, and how that legacy and the nation might have been different if he had lived a longer life. King altered the course of American history, but he died with many of his dreams unrealized.

To contextualize King’s assassination, Swanson devotes much of the book to King’s life and his work in the civil rights movement. Although the book is about King’s murder and the months-long manhunt for James Earl Ray, understanding King’s work and the building tension of the civil rights movement is essential for understanding the tragedy of his assassination and the scale of the FBI’s search for Ray. 

Although King battled tirelessly for the cause of racial equality, he was a controversial figure who was not universally loved. Even within the civil rights movement, some other Black leaders, such as Malcolm X (See: Key Figures), opposed King’s strategy of nonviolent resistance. As the 1960s progressed and frustration at the civil rights movement’s slow progress mounted, some leaders “saw nonviolence as a kind of appeasement or surrender” (76) and advocated for Black people to fight back against the violence they faced.