Threats by Amelia Gray

Image via Untoward.

During my true crime kick, I picked up Threats by Amelia Gray, which is neither true nor really crime. I feel unable to write a traditional review about it. For her collection of flash fiction, AM/PM, which you can listen to some of here, I will write a reaction to the author herself in less than 300 words.

...

When you compare a character to a pay phone on an empty desert highway, I am conflicted. Pretty image. But, what the fuck? Many of your images are rich, sensual, and memorable. However, am I just too tied up in plot? At times, I felt like I was just being taken for a ride in someone else's self-indulgent dive into what they think is interesting and weird. I got bored. Sorry!

I'm apologizing because I've just listened to your interview on the novel, and you seem like a nice person. Regarding that interview, I totally understand the occasional inability to figure out your characters in a few short words, and the need to expand. I also understand the experience where you try to expand and it's just not working.

I wonder if you fell for strange characters like David with his dirty robe and layers of beauty creams and ants for housemates, like the odd little boy running the police office who knows where the sugar cereal is, and desperately desired a place for them but have no story to tell. You tell about "grief" with grotesque acts and happenings, but if there must be a novel, I feel like a plot needs to at least get plopped in there to give the reader a reason to spend her time on a novel.

By the way, I really wasn't feeling the psychologist in the garage with the wasps. Didn't hold the same sting (I don't care, I said it) that it could have in a flash piece.

Would not read again. Would definitely read AM/PM now that I've learned of it. Am definitely inspired to forge on with my own flash intentions. In that case, I would say you succeeded. Thanks!

...

What have you read recently that didn't hold up for you?

Richard Lloyd Parry's 'People Who Eat Darkness'

I almost passed up this book, figuring I'd pick it up later when I wouldn't feel guilty about splurging. But, I always encourage people to buy books more, so I took my own advice.

This true crime book by London Times Asia editor Richard Lloyd Parry chronicles the Lucie Blackman  case, popular in British tabloids in the early 2000s. Ms. Blackman was a 21 year old British woman visiting Tokyo for a short time in hopes of making money to pay off credit card debts. Her job as a "hostess" in a bar is dubious, her happiness clearly not present. Soon enough, Lucie's friend get a call from a stranger saying that Lucie has run away with a cult and won't be coming back. 

In fact, it's no mystery that she doesn't come back at all. Like many missing person cases, it's assumed that the missing is actually dead. From there, Lucie's family falls into more pieces than it already was in, the Tokyo police conduct a drawn out and questionably sufficient investigation, and eventually a trial leads to a surprising verdict. Parry does draw out the verdict, but it's very much worth it. 

Much like In Cold Blood isn't just about "who-dunnit," People Who Eat Darkness isn't just about the dangers of young girls going off alone. 

It's about Japanese culture, foreigners in Japan culture, and the cultural history of Koreans in Japan. While Japan is highly populated, its violent crime rate is one of the lowest rates in the world. Yet, crimes do happen, and if they happen for similar psychological reasons than they do in the US, for example, they why do they happen far less in Japan? There's no easy answer, as the book states.

It's also about the public's perception of grieving families. Lucie's father, Tim Blackman, exhibited an unconventional reaction to the news that his daughter was working as paid company to Japanese businessmen and has gone missing, leaving the peanut gallery to create gossip and shoot accusations. It reminded me a lot of the public's popular reaction to the Casey Anthony verdict. People who didn't know her personally at all, and probably never will, knew that she was guilty, knew exactly what happened before, during, and after the murder—at least they said they did with great passion. 

Tim Blackman was often pointed out for not baring as much emotion as onlookers would expect a father of a murder, and was particularly chastised for stating that though he was angry and hurt he also felt sorry for his daughter's accused murderer. His unexpected reactions muddy the public's own expectations. Parry writes: 

If Lucie Blackman's killing was not a straightforward example of good against evil, then what was? To be told by non other than her father that there was complexity here, to see Tim striving to be hair and sympathetic to his own daughter's killer, undermined people's certainty in their own sense of right. They took Tim's lack of orthodoxy as an affront to their own. 

When heinous crimes happen, people say they want justice and that they want good to triumph over evil. In the case of Casey Anthony, they wanted to believe that it was so easy to see a woman partying while her daughter was missing and say this woman is the bad guy. But, because our justice system wants actual evidence, the jury couldn't make a simple good-and-evil, black-and-white decision. And, because they are not in the shoes of Tim Blackman, they can't decide if he looks sad enough or not. 

If you are an admirer of Japan's mystery, and an admirer of mysteries, you must read this! 

Jon Krakauer's 'Under the Banner of Heaven'

Returning to Red Hill Books after finishing In Cold Blood, the friendly salesperson suggested Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer to continue my true crime kick. Having read Into the Wild as a teen, I didn't know he wrote anything but adventure stories. Though, this was a case of two brothers who brutally murdered their sister-in-law and niece because they believed God told them to. The brothers were once Latter Day Saints until the became Mormon Fundamentalists. 

The book is framed around the above-mentioned crime, delving into the history of Mormonism in America. Before this book, the extent of my knowledge in Mormon history only went as deep as the US's struggle for the state of Utah and the argument of polygamy. That, and the little bit that's covered in the "Joseph Smith" episode of South Park. This history is fascinating, and Krakauer is thorough in illustrating the timeline so that it's clear how this history leads to the murder of a mother and daughter. 

While I trust that he's as truthful and unbiased as he can, I wonder if I am being as unbiased a reader as I can. I went into this not having a good opinion about Mormonism or most organized religions. I mean, Mormons wouldn't welcome black men (nevermind women of any race) into their priesthood again until 1978. That's kind of shitty, wouldn't you think? They're also largely homophobic. Shitty. 

But, despite the bloodiness of the Utah Mormons in mid-19th century (impersonating Shivwit tribesmen and murdering Gentile settlers), is American history on the whole so clean? Is current Americanism really that clean? 

I think it's important for Americans to know more about Mormonism and Mormon Fundamentalism, and from various points of view. I think it's important for us reading these histories to understand that it's all very complicated. 

In the grand scheme of things, is it really worth saying Mormons are worse/better than this group or that group? What it all comes down to is who the boss is, right? Right now, it's not Angela, and that's a problem. 

One of those interviewed is an excommunicated Fundamentalist Mormon named Deloy Batemen. He thinks that the Fundamental Mormons who grow up in remote, tight-knit communities "are probably happier, on the whole, than people on the outside." Makes sense, because if you never do go "outside," and are convinced that where you are and who you are is practically Heaven, you'd be pretty pleased. 

Though, he goes on to say that, "some things in life are more important than being happy. Like being free to think for yourself." 

Well, I agree with that, no matter who says it. 

Appendix: You might be interested in reading the LDS's critique of the book here. 

Also, you can see pics from one of the weirdest sites I've visited, in one of the nicest cities I've visited, Salt Lake City. If every city was as populated by as many conformity-and-obedience-obsessed people as SLC is, every city would probably be very nice. Then again, maybe it's better to thinking freely in stinky ol' San Francisco or gritty azz Pittsburgh. 

Have you read this book? What do you think? 

Are you Mormon or know Mormons? Feel free to express your opinion on the book!

Truman Capote's 'In Cold Blood'

Stopping by Red Hill Books, the neighborhood staple for the Bernal Heights bibliophile, I was on a mission to solve a mystery—what is out there for me to get lost in?

The store's true crime section is, unfortunately, only about three feet long and arranged at an unreachable height for everyone but Shaq. With my eyes straining to read the available titles, I wasn't sure where to even start. I thought about asking the helpful Red Hill Books staff, only both of them were in deep conversation with a customer over the validity (or lack thereof) of Dads Are the Original Hipsters. 

I didn't really want to read a Mystery, a paperback with a badly designed cover assaulting the eyes every time you pick it up, which is often as the covers would brag. And, I didn't want to risk making an unwise decision, like settling for Helter Skelter only to experience sleepless nights waiting for a troupe of murderers to surprise me.

After circling the store about eight times, I remembered! Mrs. Rutger's American Lit class, Junior year.  We had to pick an American-written novel and perform a creative presentation for a grade. I did A Farewell to Arms, heh. To one of the lesser enthusiastic of the students, my teacher suggested In Cold Blood because it was "violent." I totally recall her saying just that.

Well later, the student joked about how he only watched the movie. But, I always remembered the title as something I should read one day. I had read Capote's short story, "Breakfast at Tiffany's," so I couldn't fathom how he had written a "violent" true crime. During my wandering at Red Hill Books, I would find out! I finally located it in fiction, which was kind of annoying.

Very short synopsis—In 1959, rural Kansas, a town is shook up by the seemingly motiveless, bloody murders of a well-liked family. While touching on the investigation, the real focus is on the murderers themselves, their lives leading up the incident, their life right after.

Finishing it in only a few weeks (I'm a slow reader), I was lost in it. I expected it to read more like journalism, but it's skillfully written almost like fiction. Capote takes liberties with or enhancing the details of the "characters" lives. The way he illustrates Nancy Clutter chatting on the phone as a chipper teen girl would, the way Mrs. Clutter escapes the days away sleeping in her white socks and nightgown, the piggish eating habits of Dick and the root beer and aspirin Perry—all described in Capote's oddly spunky yet still shudder-inducing tone.

The only thing with this fiction-like journalism—or probably by definition, creative nonfiction—is that you, as the reader, should keep in mind that very term "creative nonfiction." Just like any piece of that genre, the author may take liberties, and not always to straight up deceive the reader, but to make a better story. Without getting into a debate on how much an author's truthfulness really matters in creative nonfiction, I just wanted to point out that this book is indeed creative nonfiction. Enjoy the story.

This isn't a "who-dunnit" mystery. While there are pointed fingers among the townsfolk, the reader knows exactly "who dunnit" less than twenty pages in. The mystery is the motive of the murder until that's actually solved. Then, the real mystery, the one that haunts the reader throughout the book, is finally addressed—Still, why did they do it? Once you understand their actual plan, and the failure in that plan, and more importantly who these men really are, you still wonder why they did it in the way that they did. I guess you can ask, What really makes a murderer?

Yes, I recommend it!

I had a wonderful journey with Truman Capote, tracking it down and reading it on the train to work and even on the beach in Santa Cruz (you know, just a little light reading on the shore). Currently, I am finishing up Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer, as part of my true crime kick. I look forward to writing about that one, too!

Have you read In Cold Blood? What do you think?