by Susan Nordin Vinocour ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 24, 2020
A satisfying courtroom drama that hits the sweet spot between good storytelling and sharp legal analysis.
A mentally ill grandmother’s desperate plight exposes a deep gulf between science and the law when it comes to the insanity defense.
For two days after her 3-year-old grandson died, Dorothy Dunn (a pseudonym) slept with the boy’s corpse, moving it on and off a heating grate hoping to maintain a lifelike body temperature. That and other unfathomable actions factored into the insanity defense Dunn’s public defender built after a prosecutor charged the “compliant and meek,” impoverished, black mother of five with second-degree murder. Debut author Vinocour—a clinical and forensic psychologist who had earlier practiced law and later served as an expert witness in Dunn’s trial before a largely white jury—evaluated the defendant and found her to be mentally ill. The author reconstructs the case in a chilling book that interpolates into Dunn’s tragic story a history of the insanity defense and famous related events, including the attempted assassinations of James Garfield and Ronald Reagan and the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School. Insanity defense laws vary by state, but Vinocour argues persuasively that the law overall lags far behind scientific research on mental illness. A widely used legal test of insanity is whether someone knows “right” from “wrong,” but mental illness is too complex for that standard, which implies falsely that “an intelligent or educated person can never be, legally, insane.” Though the author has changed many “identifying details,” making it uncertain that the events unfolded, as she writes, in Rochester, New York, and other pertinent facts, the story is unquestionably a page-turner, and revealing the ending would be a spoiler. It’s fair to say, however, that in this case, nobody wins—except perhaps for a prosecutor later elected judge after unironically billing himself as a defender of “the highest standards of the criminal justice system.”
A satisfying courtroom drama that hits the sweet spot between good storytelling and sharp legal analysis.Pub Date: March 24, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-393-65192-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
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by William Strunk & E.B. White ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 15, 1972
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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