Rogue Lawyer

Rogue Lawyer by John Grisham

Sebastian Rudd is a street lawyer.  His office is in a bulletproof van, he has no partners, and only one employee whose name is Partner.  Partner is Sebastian's driver, law clerk, and body guard. Sebastian is not afraid to take on clients other attorneys avoid.  He believes everyone is entitled to a fair trial, no matter what they've done.

John Grisham is always good at writing legal thrillers, and this one does not disappoint.  He has written this book in a different format with chapters and parts, each part representing a different story and client.  Sebastian Rudd is the protagonist in the story, he is a street wise, colorful, likeable lawyer, who defends some unsavory characters.  He works out of his van, equipped with wi-fi, a bar, a small fridge and leather chairs.  His home, a small apartment with the main piece of furniture being a vintage pool table.  Playing pool helps Sebastian relax and think.  Sebastian makes many enemies throughout the story and his personal life is a mess, but I found myself cheering for him all along the way.

The President's Garden

I’m reviewing Muhsin Al-Ramli’s epic novel of modern Iraq, The President's Gardens. It was first published in Arabic in 2012, and in this English translation by Luke Leafgren in 2017, by Maclehose Press. I read it for the World Literature discussion group on Goodreads, which is reading Arabic fiction this year. It is available in the Library in the Adult Fiction section under Ramli.

The President's Gardens is dedicated "To the souls of my nine relatives slaughtered on the third day of Ramadan, 2006/And to all the oppressed in Iraq." The first sentence is, "In a land without bananas, the village awoke to nine banana crates, each containing the severed head of one of its sons." So while fiction, this is obviously not entirely an imaginary story.

One of the nine is Ibrahim Suhayl, and we see the reactions of the villagers, and especially his two closest friends, Abdullah and Tariq. The beheading occurs shortly after the American invasion: who is responsible? The Americans and their supporters? The supporters of Saddam Hussein? Or some other group opposed to both? We aren't told. But although we are left to wonder, the novel is not a mystery. It is the story of three boyhood friends, Ibrahim the Fated, Tariq the Befuddled, and Abdullah Kafka, as they nicknamed each other -- collectively known to themselves and the village as the sons of the earth crack.

After the first chapter, the book flashes back to the discovery of a newborn baby in a crack in the earth, and his adoption by a childless couple, who name him Abdullah. The story then proceeds mainly in chronological order, through the childhood of the three inseparable friends, their adolescence and adulthood. We see through their eyes the horrors of the Iran-Iraq War, the invasion of Kuwait and the first war with the NATO allies, as well as the brutality of the Saddam Hussein regime. We learn what really went on in the President's beautiful gardens and palaces. We also see the condition of women in an Iraqi village -- the forced arranged marriages, and the "honor" killings. As with the earlier novels I have read by this author, Broken Crumbs and Dates on My Fingers, the political violence is relieved by episodes of friendship, romance, and even humor -- but in this novel, the balance tips to the darker aspects.

In the last pages, the story catches up to the first chapter, and the novel ends with Ibrahim's daughter Qisma setting off with Tariq to try to find her father's body and information about who killed him. This quest is presumably the subject of the recently published sequel, Daughter of the Tigris.

I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to go beyond the headlines and the superficial media propaganda to understand what these decades under Saddam Hussein were actually like for the people of Iraq.

The Illness Lesson

 The Illness Lesson by Clare Beams

At their newly founded school, Samuel Hood and his daughter, Caroline, promise a groundbreaking education for young women. But Caroline has grave misgivings. After all, her own unconventional education has left her unmarriageable and isolated, unsuited to the narrow roles afforded women in nineteenth-century New England. When a mysterious flock of red birds descends on the town, Caroline alone seems to find them unsettling. But it’s not long before the assembled students begin to manifest bizarre symptoms: rashes, seizures, headaches, verbal tics, night wandering.
One by one, they sicken. Fearing ruin for the school, Samuel overrules Caroline’s pleas to inform the girls’ parents and turns instead to a noted physician, a man whose sinister ministrations-based on a shocking historic treatment-horrify Caroline. As the men around her continue to dictate, disastrously, all terms of the girls’ experience, Caroline’s body too begins to betray her. To save herself and her young charges, she will have to defy every rule that has governed her life, her mind, her body, and her world.

Taken from book cover

An eerie look into the past practices of medicine. This book read like a thriller mystery.

18 Tiny Deaths

18 Tiny Deaths: The untold story of Frances Glessner Lee and the invention of modern forensics

Frances Glessner Lee was born into a wealthy family and remanined independently wealthy her entire life.  Because she was a woman she was denied admission to Harvard.  She did not persue formal education further at that time.  She married and raised a family.  In her middle age she talked with an old friend who was a medical examiner.  That conversation led to her interest in forensics and how they were handled at the time.  She studied the current system and found it very unscientific.  She searched for information and understanding of a better system.  She became a very knowledgeable source. She started a library on the subject at Harvard Medical College.  She also contributed a great deal of her own money to a medical science department.  She hosted seminars at Harvard to teach law enforcement modern techniques.  She also created 18  scale models of crime scenes to teach  crime scene observation.

Without formal training in the area of forensics she became interested and learned all she could.  Anyone can look around and find something of interest to explore and expand their own knowledge.