Category Archives: Opinion

BOSTON SHAME

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It’s Memorial Day and I think it’s sad that on a day we remember those who died in war (for me, all the unnecessary deaths that have occurred throughout my lifetime), I must write about twelve people in a Boston courtroom deciding to kill Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

One person might not seem like much of a do compared to those who’ve died in all our wars, but for me that decision by those twelve people turned a light on how we as a species operate.

! know the two Tsarnaev brothers murdered three and injured hundreds of others. Some see killing him as more than a fair trade—though a poll shows that 73 percent of Boston’s population was against the death sentence a month before it was handed down by those twelve. In a state that outlaws the death penalty.

I don’t see a fair trade. Just another murder to go along with the others.

The day their verdict was announced I was in New York visiting my infant granddaughters. My first reaction was relief that Mari and Vivian can’t read. How could I explain that my home town decided to murder someone? That those twelve people felt it was “appropriate” to kill another human under the federal government cover of the death penalty. The first execution, by the way, of any “terrorist” since 9/11.

What would I have said to them if they had been able to understand? That a human life is worth next to nothing? Really, all you have to do is open a newspaper to see that it’s cheaper than dirt. Bombs, beheadings, drones, and routine day-to-day murders. We seem willing to kill each other as easily as we step on ants.

I could sit here and detail all the “logical” arguments against the death penalty. How it has proven not to be a deterrent. How we might mistakenly murder an innocent person. How it costs the government more to kill people than have them serve life sentences. How many of the victims of the bombing–people who lost loved ones or had been maimed–spoke out against murdering Tsarnaev.

Not gonna do that. That’s not my point today. For me, the questions are: Do we want to step on ants and murder people? Is it possible to have institutions and governments people might learn from and even respect? Or are we willing to abide starving children, fouling our environment, and sanctioning state murder? Is that the kind of species we really want to be? Or can we be better than that?

What kind of world do you want your grandchildren to grow up in?

But, but, look at the rest of the world. They kill, starve their own, slice off heads, and seem more than willing to fight wars. If the rest of the world is like that, why should we be any different?

I grew up when history books touted our revolution as a beacon of freedom for the rest of the world. Which I believed. And still believe that we can become an example of a kind and loving people. But, honestly? I think I’m going to die believing that we’ve contributed at least as much, if not more, barbarism as any country throughout history. Since 1776 the United States has been at war 93% of the time. Call me crazy but from where I sit right now, the only beacon I see is blood.

I’ve written about my issues with Boston’s response to the Marathon bombings before and have been pretty critical about the way my city’s population was more than willing to ignore their own civil liberties. But there is no doubt that in the bombing’s aftermath the town came together: people treating each other with respect and kindness, often  exhibiting the very best of our species’ behavior. “Boston Strong” was a phrase that meant the unification of my city. That we could stand shoulder to shoulder as brothers and sisters. That we, as a city, could be larger, better than those who maimed and killed. That Boston Strong now seems shattered by those twelve people.

My town has a proud but flawed history. An important station destination for the Underground Railroad coupled with the New England slave trade. The first school desegregation case in American history (1848) and rock-throwing racists in the 1970s when desegregation was finally implemented. A city of neighborhoods where it’s difficult to find one that’s actually integrated. And now we have another ugly stain on our history.

I don’t believe in the Tooth Fairy, Tinkerbell, or even Santa Claus. I don’t believe in Utopia.

But I do believe our species can be a whole lot better than we’ve shown. Don’t you think it’s time to start? Do rivers have to run red before we see the folly of war? Why can’t we try to feed the hungry, house the homeless, care for the ill, and begin to turn our back on the notion that it’s everyone for themselves?

What kind of world do you want your grandchildren to inhabit?

What did the people we are remembering today die for?

I think they died believing in making our world a safer, more humane place to live. Where Boston Strong doesn’t crumple into Boston Shame.

What kind of world do you want your grandchildren to inhabit?

In recognizing the humanity of our fellow beings, we pay ourselves the highest tribute. ~ Thurgood Marshall

ANOTHER DAY LATE…

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and this time a few dollars short, which I spent on books. Saturday was Independent Bookstore Day. Yes I know that three out of my four books live in the e-Book world; only one can (hopefully) be found in an indie bookshop near you. But ya gotta give it up for those stores that survived and often thrived despite the onslaught of mega-merchants.

Back in the day, I not only learned how to write, (thank you Susan), it was only after my first book was published, that I also discovered how things worked after a book was released—at least in those years. Publishers had reps who visited, toiled with those who stocked the bookstore shelves, and presented their newly published list.

I was lucky. Truth is, my publisher’s rep cared as much about the bookstore as she did the publisher. She often knew the store’s overall stock as well as its booksellers, even its owner. I know this because she and I became friends and I occasionally accompanied her when she did her rounds. In fact, we became close enough that Susan and I began to get invited to rep parties—not only hers, but those of reps with other publishers.

Learned a real lesson. Basically I discovered that representatives from all different legacy publishing houses not only read their own house’s books, but swapped with other houses’ reps to keep up with what was being published. Also because they simply loved to read.

I’ve been to parties with writers, editors, and some pretty intellectual people, but I’ve never heard better party talk than the book discussions at those rep’s houses. Pretty amazing and lots of fun.

But, like everything else, good things come to an end

Barnes & Noble and Borders began to blow up individual bookstores—including smaller chains—and that made publisher reps another sacrificial group of lambs. Some survived, but not many.

Then came the Internet with Amazon et al. Stores I visited on a regular basis during the 90s simply no longer exist. I find this a painful reality. Not just because there are less brick-and-mortar outlets for authors, but because the whale who swallowed Jonah also gobbled everything else in sight to grow larger and more profitable. Trying to feed upon those who not only loved books, but stuck with scraping by because of that love.

So, given huge chains (including Walmart and Costco) and the Internet, we’re at a place where the independent bookstores that survived often thrived because of their customers’ loyalty. And they are even better than ever. Their clerks are not only friendly and helpful, but have often read many of the books their store carries. You walk into these independent stores and see cards stuck under specific books with a clerk’s comments, recommendations that say, “if you enjoyed this book you might like…” Some shops have entire shelves stocked with books that their workers enjoyed.

And of course, independent bookstores continue to be the places where authors speak, read, answer questions from the general public and, of course, sign their books. It’s certainly a treasure for writers, whose work life by definition is solitary and it’s an economic necessity and a pleasure—perhaps more so for writers than the people who come to hear us. As I’ve said in previous columns, there are a lot of pluses involved with e-Books and online publishing. But sadly there just aren’t as many places to mix as there once were. It’s not really an option to hang out at Amazon, Kobo, ITunes or any other internet book selling establishment and chat with readers.

I started off my Patriot’s Day column apologizing to Brookline Booksmith. They had invited me to speak at the store shortly after TIES THAT BLIND was newly published and I had planned to put up pictures of the event for my next column. But sometimes columns, like novels, begin to tell you what to write rather than the other way around. And with the running of the Boston Marathon coinciding with the verdict of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, I felt I had to write about the death penalty instead.

But what better time to be back to the Booksmith than the column that extols indie bookstores? I have a lot of people and places to thank for my writing career and, not the least of which, are the wonderful people at Brookline Booksmith. You hung in there with me for close to two decades. Thank you.

In tribute, here is a video link that presents a collage of their long and storied history, replete with famous and not so famous authors. (If you watch it all the way through you will catch a glimpse of a not famous, but younger and a much better looking me.)

PATRIOTS’ DAY

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Dear Brookline Booksmith,

Thanks so much for inviting me to visit your wonderful independent bookstore to read and do a Q&A with fellow mystery novelist Peter Swanson. During the 1990s every time I published a Matt Jacob Novel, you invited me to speak. On top of which, after twenty years and my latest book about Matt Jacob (Ties That Blind), you invited me back again. I appreciate your generosity and love your store. I had intended to put up pictures and comments until I realized this column belonged to Patriots’ Day and not my personal accomplishments. (For those of you who might want to see a couple pictures, please visit my Facebook Authors page and, if so inclined, “like” the page.)

Patriots’ Day is a Massachusetts and Maine holiday commemorating the Revolutionary War battles of Lexington and Concord. Historically it had been celebrated on April 19th, but in 1969 it was changed to the third Monday of every April. This year both days coincide. (Perhaps an omen given the upcoming sentencing trial of the Boston Marathon bomber.)

I used to really enjoy the holiday. For a ton of years my friend Ed and I would go to Fenway Park and watch the Red Sox, who traditionally began their game at 11 AM. We’d hang there until around the 7th inning, (those days the cost for tickets made leaving early reasonable) then walk to our favorite vantage point to cheer on the Boston Marathon runners as they passed by.

I don’t know why, or even when, we stopped our annual pilgrimage. Long enough ago that I’d even stopped watching the winners cross the finish line on TV.

Patriots’ Day 2013 burst my complacency when two bombs exploded close to the Marathon’s finish line, killing at least three, and injuring or maiming hundreds more. Soon after, the Boston Police and Federal Agents linked the horror to the shooting of an M.I.T. security guard and the theft of an S.U.V., which was eventually spotted in Watertown, a city nearby Boston.

Police from Boston and neighboring towns, along with Federal Agents, converged upon the town and shot one of the suspects who was then killed when his brother (the other suspect) inadvertently ran him over in his attempt to escape. Eventually, this second suspect was seen in a boat placed in a yard behind a Watertown resident who informed the authorities.

A massive gunfight ensued in which the authorities fired over three hundred rounds, despite which the suspect lived, brought to a Federal trial, and recently (April 8th) the suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, was found guilty of 30 counts, including 17 that carry the death penalty.

In a previous column I wrote and condemned the abrogation of civil liberties imposed upon Boston and its surrounding towns during the entire manhunt. No need to rehash the matter, other than to say that my post found very few people who agreed with my positions.

I expect the same today as I advocate against the death penalty for Tsarnaev.

During the trial, prosecutors relentlessly used the death of eight-year-old Martin Richard (the youngest of those who died) to impress upon the jury the heinous and depraved nature of Tsarnaev’s actions—including submitting Martin’s burnt clothes into evidence. But this 17th of April, Martin’s parents wrote a public letter requesting that the Feds take the death penalty off the table in exchange for life imprisonment without parole and the relinquishment of all the defendant’s appeals. While I laud the humanity of that letter and fully appreciate their desire for “closure,” my reasons are quite different.

I believe the death penalty is nothing less than state sanctioned murder. And, in this particular situation, the “state” isn’t Massachusetts (a NO DEATH PENALTY STATE by law) but the federal government that overrode state law and tried Tsarnaev under federal laws which allow the possibility of execution.

Let me be absolutely clear. What the Tsarnaev brothers did was totally, reprehensible, unconscionable, and, to me, virtually incomprehensible. I was, and continue to be, repulsed by their actions, which make me stomach sick.

But so do hangings, electrocutions, firing squads, and lethal injections—no matter who does the deed, be it an individual, group, gang, or government.

I am in no way, shape, or form a religious person. But I do adhere to Thou Shalt Not Kill and no amount of lawyering or any circumstance other than defense of self, family, or another person (which even the “god” who said the above permits) can convince me that the words Thou Shalt Not Kill are anything other than what they mean. Killing an innocent or a guilty is flat out murder—whatever suit you dress it in.

For those who legitimately question the cost of housing and feeding murderers, in a recent conversation with a judge I was informed that studies have indicated the taxpayer’s share of the costs of appeals and “stays” of state sanctioned murder are even greater. (To say nothing about our burgeoning “for profit” prisons.)

And I haven’t even delved into the issue of whether a judge or jury gets it wrong—as Project Innocence has shown time and time again.

On this Patriots’ Day I think it important to really ask what kind of country we want to be patriots of.

TOUGH TIME OF THE YEAR

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Last Tuesday night, I went out for dinner and drinks with my friend/music teacher Bob. Although he’s a few years younger than I am, our ages are within hailing distance. After talking about the state of the Red Sox we began to reminisce about Brooklyn. He grew up there and it’s where I went to a Hasidic yeshiva during my high-school years. Surprisingly, we both had experiences with the Jewish Defense League (JDL) and the transformations of what had been primarily Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods.

It was those transformations (in plain speak, Blacks moving into those neighborhoods) that sparked the creation of the JDL. For reasons I honestly can’t explain, one of the rabbis at my yeshiva took me to a couple of the early meetings led by Meir Kahane, the rabbi who formed the JDL. This sense of encroachment into what they considered “their” space enraged the Hasidic and Orthodox communities. So Kahane was organizing neighborhood “watch” groups to communicate with each other and follow every Black male who rode a bike and wore sneakers. It was made clear that violence was not off the table.

I lasted two meetings before I told my rabbi I had no interest in Kahane’s mission (which included applying for gun licenses) and suggested that he shouldn’t have anything to do with the group either. I can’t remember what he said, but I quickly lost his support at the yeshiva where he had often protected me from beatings by other rabbis.

So be it. I hadn’t learned much growing up in my nuclear family, but I’d been taught in no uncertain terms that racism was evil, pure and simple, and not to be tolerated. Kahane represented everything I detested even at that early age. I believed Jews were supposed to be on the side of the oppressed. Never Again was never meant to be an expression of hostility, but rather one of defense.

That’s why Passover has become, for me, a major league conundrum. The holiday expresses the belief in freedom, the sin of slavery, at the same time it praises the lord for slaughtering anyone who stood in the way of the Jewish exodus—and anyone included innocent firstborn babies to boot. The older I’ve become, the more deeply I believe in non-violence. And believe it to be the only real salvation for our species. Yet here we have a story where, without remorse, god used horrific violence to set my people free. How is it possible to embrace my history when the beginning of our own freedom was born from the blood and death of people who our own bible calls half-brothers?

That Old Testament god really knew how to wield a sword and didn’t stop after the parting of the seas. Nor has his “Chosen.” Why does the Israeli government use the honorable idea of Never Again to rationalize keeping Palestinians under their thumb, using incomprehensible, reprehensible violence to do so? I’ve written about Israeli atrocities and US support of them before so there’s no reason to rehash the same ugly facts. But knowing those facts and watching Israel become an apartheid country without any interest in a fair two-state solution just makes it harder to celebrate my own peoples’ liberation.

Despite all those years in yeshivas, I’m not at all religious, but I do think of myself as Jewish. And I continue to tell myself that being Jewish still means taking the side of the oppressed, fighting for those in need. I grasp at the straw hoping somehow Jews will actually see what’s in front of their eyes and reject the violence against the Palestinians and even reject the violence of that Old Testament god who vengefully set us free.

I look for other ways, nonviolent organizations like Jewish Voice For Peace that back boycotts, disinvestments, and sanctions as major tools for Israeli political change. I tell myself that this was the way apartheid in South Africa was finally (and relatively peacefully) abolished. But although I support the JVP, I’m not particularly hopeful. Given the amount of money our politicians receive from American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Since 1998, AIPAC has spent $20,269,436 lobbying on the Hill, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to tracking money in politics.) and the blind willingness of our government to dump more and more aid to Israel (After World War II the United States has provided Israel at least $121 billion [current, or non-inflation-adjusted, dollars] in bilateral assistance.) with most going to their military. So what is there to hope for?

Now, I’m not a historian but I imagine most, if not all, nations have been created from blood and violence of one type or another. And I assume this has been true from the start of our species. But I am also growing to accept the disheartening reality that any people born from bloodletting will eventually use violence against others. Sad to say, I guess that’s what it means to be human.

I have decided to stick to love…Hate is too great a burden to bear.
Martin Luther King Jr.

SOME FINE LINES

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Since my books have all been published this month as eBooks and the latest as both an eBook and trade paperback, I’ve been in author mode. As a result I found myself reading their first chapters. Then I thought it might be fun to find some great lines (most are first sentences but not all) that weren’t mine and present them here. As I said in the notice for this column I’d love people to add their own favorites in the comment section. Remember, Umberto Eco once said, “The list is the origin of culture.”

“If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” – J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

“Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” – Charles Dickens, David Copperfield

“Unlike the typical bluesy earthy folksy denim-overalls noble-in-the-face-of-cracker-racism aw shucks Pulitzer-Prize-winning protagonist mojo magic black man, I am not the seventh son of the seventh son of the seventh son.” – Paul Beatty, The White Boy Shuffle

“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” – Samuel Beckett, Murphy

“I don’t hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England dark; I don’t. I don’t! I don’t hate it! I don’t hate it!” – William Faulkner, Absalom, Absalom!

“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.” – Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” – Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

“In your rocking-chair, by your window dreaming, shall you long, alone. In your rocking-chair, by your window, shall you dream such happiness as you may never feel.” – Theodore Dreiser, Sister Carrie

“Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost.” – Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, The Inferno

“I’ll make my report as if I told a story, for I was taught as a child on my homeworld that Truth is a matter of the imagination.” – Ursula K. LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness

“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” – George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four

“When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon.” – James Crumley, The Last Good Kiss

“Anger was washed away in the river along with any obligation.” – Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms

“The night of my mother’s funeral, Linda Dawson cried on my shoulder, put her tongue in my mouth and asked me to find her husband.” – Declan Hughes, The Wrong Kind of Blood

“Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun.” – Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“Like the waters of the river, like the motorists on the highway, and like the yellow trains streaking down the Santa Fe tracks, drama, in the shape of exceptional happenings, had never stopped there.” – Truman Capote, In Cold Blood

“You wouldn’t think we’d have to leave Chicago to see a dead body.” – Richard Peck, A Long Way from Chicago

“It was a fine cry—loud and long—but it had no bottom and it had no top, just circles and circles of sorrow.” – Toni Morrison, Sula

“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” – William Gibson, Neuromancer

“The story so far: In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” – Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” – L. P. Hartley, The Go-Between

“True! – nervous – very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” – Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart

“Granted: I AM an inmate of a mental hospital; my keeper is watching me, he never lets me out of his sight; there’s a peep-hole in the door, and my keeper’s eye is the shade of brown that can never see through a blue-eyed type like me.” – Gunter Grass, The Tin Drum

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul.” – Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita

“I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.” – James Joyce, Ulysses

“The cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.” – Carl Sagan, Cosmos