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3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
Phenomenal. Addresses mental health, addiction, the death penalty controversy, police corruption, lies, bribes, and more. I think the author really did justice in telling Ron’s story respectfully.
challenging
dark
informative
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
WOW!! What a disturbing book. If it wasn't true, it would be a good story but the fact that it is true is so disturbing. These men were railroaded from the start. No evidence to speak of and cops that were determined that they were guilty somehow sent these men to prison and one to death row. the fact that he was mentally ill was never even mentioned in his first trial. This shows how screwed up our justice system is and this was not a case of a poor black man getting the short end of the stick as we all know happens so often in our country but this was a small town hero. He was a well liked white athlete that had his life ruined and basically thrown away due to this injustice. If it can happen to him, it can happen to anyone. That scares the hell out of me.
John Grisham may have gotten his hands on a good story here, but he told it so unskillfully that I had to put it down.
Some of John Grisham's books start off a bit slow. This one is no exception. The book was good but it had its moments where I was lost: too many characters mentioned at once.
Full disclosure: I didn't make it through the whole book--threw in the towel a little over halfway through--so take my review with a grain of salt.
I've admittedly never read anything by John Grisham before, and somehow figured his first nonfiction effort would be a good place to jump in. The storyline sounded fascinating, and it's certainly stoked my interest in the murder cases of Ada, as well as in the reality of botched convictions ... but I found the writing mired into too much excruciating detail to hold my interest. There's very little "storytelling flair"--rather, each sentence feels like a line out of a police report, involving the minutiae of decades of events down to how many Snickers bars someone purchased at a random gas station on a certain day. There's too much information, yet even amidst it all, I don't really feel like I'm reading a totally journalistic report of the events. Grisham's agenda is clear from the beginning, and the entire time I feel like I'm being hammered over the head with, "Can you believe what an incompetent ass the district attorney is?!" Even if this was the case, I don't feel like I got to make up my own mind about it.
I feel like this book could have been condensed into one, in-depth, magazine-feature-length piece and it would have been far more powerful than the rambling book of staccato sentences and tedious details that it is.
I've admittedly never read anything by John Grisham before, and somehow figured his first nonfiction effort would be a good place to jump in. The storyline sounded fascinating, and it's certainly stoked my interest in the murder cases of Ada, as well as in the reality of botched convictions ... but I found the writing mired into too much excruciating detail to hold my interest. There's very little "storytelling flair"--rather, each sentence feels like a line out of a police report, involving the minutiae of decades of events down to how many Snickers bars someone purchased at a random gas station on a certain day. There's too much information, yet even amidst it all, I don't really feel like I'm reading a totally journalistic report of the events. Grisham's agenda is clear from the beginning, and the entire time I feel like I'm being hammered over the head with, "Can you believe what an incompetent ass the district attorney is?!" Even if this was the case, I don't feel like I got to make up my own mind about it.
I feel like this book could have been condensed into one, in-depth, magazine-feature-length piece and it would have been far more powerful than the rambling book of staccato sentences and tedious details that it is.
Hmmm this book was tedious to the point where I couldn't finish it. Way too detailed and prolonged. I am perhaps not the target reader.
This book is an excellent example of why the death penalty should be abolished. I've heard a lot of stories of people who were executed but were completely innocent. And people who are released were imprisoned for years, so much of their lives taken away. And, as evident in this book, after they were released, they still have the stigma of the murder they were falsely accused for.
The book is rather dated, unoriginal and is incredibly characteristic of the white America we still see today. Beyond general disgust at the lack of equity in the Oklahoma legal system (though not surprise), the only reason I wanted Ron Williamson to be absolved of Debbie Carter’s murder was so that the real killer could be found. I couldn’t have cared less otherwise, as Williamson seemed a spoilt manchild who had run himself into psychological ruin, and done his damnedest to take his family with him, who was unable to take any accountability for his actions, and though not a murderer, was certainly not someone who should have been given the free rein he was prior to the murder. Any sympathy I started to feel was immediately alleviated upon reading Williamson’s next actions as the book went on, his constant belligerence towards his parents and later his sisters, and his inability to accept the many offers of help given to him before he is convicted of the murder, or his part in the conviction of another innocent man by association. His constant belief, encouraged by his upbringing, that he should be the number one priority of everyone around him was exhausting, and I had every sympathy for his poor beleaguered parents and sisters. Grisham tries to minimise or ignore his behaviour, calling his previous rape charges and assaults his “escapades”, and saying nothing on his assault on Andrea Hardcastle or any other women who were victimised by him.
Yes, Williamson was the victim of a corrupt legal system that wanted a quick fix and was an innocent man in that regard. But his life prior to the murder wasn’t by any means difficult, his mental health deterioration largely self-inflicted and he had so many opportunities that others don’t, to seek help for it. His baseball career non-start is largely his own fault but Grisham somehow manages to spin it so that the world is to blame not Williamson. Williamson made himself everyone else’s problem, all whilst largely declaring himself a victim of not just injustice but life generally. I found him unsympathetic and irritating, and that was with the rose tinted glasses his sisters would have worn when detailing his life to Grisham. The solving of the murder itself is treated as an afterthought, with Debbie Carter given very little background; similarly, the second murder mentioned in the book, that of Denice Haraway, is largely used as an illustrative tool on the horror of white men being blamed for rape and murder. Neither Carter nor Haraway are focused on, aside from the usual adjectives applied to female victims, that of “beautiful” and “pretty”.
The book read now comes across as very dated, failing to comment on the privilege held by Williamson aside from the occasional mentioning of others less fortunate in the prison system. I laughed out loud at a particular paragraph that, to me, totally failed to recognise the still corrupt system in which Grisham has worked in as well as the stunning ignorance displayed by the white author:
“Four men, four average white guys from good families, all chewed up and abused by the system and locked away for a combined total of thirty-three years. Their message was clear; until the system is fixed, it could happen to anyone.”
It’s like he’s being sarcastic about a system that isn’t broken, but working exactly as intended but I don’t think Grisham meant it in that way. All in all, if you’re happy to look past the misogyny, racial ignorance, and weird indoctrination that a lot of US citizens seem to have, then read on.
Yes, Williamson was the victim of a corrupt legal system that wanted a quick fix and was an innocent man in that regard. But his life prior to the murder wasn’t by any means difficult, his mental health deterioration largely self-inflicted and he had so many opportunities that others don’t, to seek help for it. His baseball career non-start is largely his own fault but Grisham somehow manages to spin it so that the world is to blame not Williamson. Williamson made himself everyone else’s problem, all whilst largely declaring himself a victim of not just injustice but life generally. I found him unsympathetic and irritating, and that was with the rose tinted glasses his sisters would have worn when detailing his life to Grisham. The solving of the murder itself is treated as an afterthought, with Debbie Carter given very little background; similarly, the second murder mentioned in the book, that of Denice Haraway, is largely used as an illustrative tool on the horror of white men being blamed for rape and murder. Neither Carter nor Haraway are focused on, aside from the usual adjectives applied to female victims, that of “beautiful” and “pretty”.
The book read now comes across as very dated, failing to comment on the privilege held by Williamson aside from the occasional mentioning of others less fortunate in the prison system. I laughed out loud at a particular paragraph that, to me, totally failed to recognise the still corrupt system in which Grisham has worked in as well as the stunning ignorance displayed by the white author:
“Four men, four average white guys from good families, all chewed up and abused by the system and locked away for a combined total of thirty-three years. Their message was clear; until the system is fixed, it could happen to anyone.”
It’s like he’s being sarcastic about a system that isn’t broken, but working exactly as intended but I don’t think Grisham meant it in that way. All in all, if you’re happy to look past the misogyny, racial ignorance, and weird indoctrination that a lot of US citizens seem to have, then read on.