Patterson's latest tackles America’s racial discord
- Brett Hiner: A Work in Progress
- September 4, 2023
- 789
A recent stroll through Barnes & Noble led me to stumbling upon Richard North Patterson’s latest book, “Trial.” I tend to stay pretty informed about when some of my favorite authors have their works landing on bookstore shelves, but Patterson has been off the literary radar for nine years, having turned his writing skills and focus to social commentary in publications like “The Wall Street Journal,” “The Bulwark” and “The Atlantic.”
For book nerds, seeing a favorite author’s new book perched orderly amongst their alphabetized friends, especially on “book release day,” is every bit as addictive as the kid clamoring for his favorite candy bar at the grocery store; it is the anticipation of something hopeful and great to come. So the book adrenaline was in high gear, simply because this book caught me unawares.
I did not need to read the jacket cover synopsis, nor did I need to look up reviews. Some authors earn that trust with their readers, even if nine years is a long time to keep their fans waiting (George R.R. Martin fans know this better than anyone). So I grabbed the book and a copy of ESPN’s Fantasy Football Magazine for some draft advice — this is the year I win the family league, I’m sure of it — and headed to the café for a small, er, sorry … “short” cup of coffee.
Thirteen pages in, I knew the book would consume most, if not all, of my available free moments.
Patterson has never been one to shy away from the moral imperatives of our time, usually mixing the world of politics and law with grandiose issues he grounds in rich character development.
With “Trial” he tackles what he calls “America’s accelerating racial discord.” It is a story of black and white/right and wrong told mostly through the lens of Congressman Chase Brevard, who shares a biracial son with political activist Allie Hill. Their son Malcolm stands on trial for the shooting death of a white sheriff deputy. With that premise Patterson dissects race, the justice system, voter suppression and social activism through both the white and black experience and lens.
For some, therein lies the problem.
Prior to “Trial,” 16 of Patterson’s 22 novels had been New York Times' Best Sellers. He has sold over 25 million books, so one would understand his confidence when he typed his last period and turned his focus to a publisher. Yet by his own admission, 19 publishers turned him and his book away, based mostly on the notion of their belief that white authors can no longer write about the black experience.
Some may recall, similarly, the negative outcry author Jeanine Cummins experienced back in 2020 when she wrote of Mexican migrants in “American Dirt.” Cummins canceled her book tour over threats she and her publisher were receiving.
To be clear, I am in no way qualified to speak on the ins and outs of the publishing world, which, I would assume, contains enough marketing research on one subject/book to rival the total pages written by Dostoevsky.
But it begs the question: Are only those personally identifiable to an experience safely allowed to depict that experience through fictional characters?
Maybe better phrased by Patterson himself, “Should empathy and imagination be allowed to cross the lines of racial (or gender) identity?”
I tend to approach these questions both as a parent and as a professional whose world is inhabited by imagination on a daily basis. Most English teachers approach fiction, first, as a sense of discovery, knowing year after year, while the words on the page of a book remain the same, the experiences students bring to a piece of fiction change greatly.
It is through careful, planned-for inquiries that allows for nurtured understanding of worlds we may not experience. Whether that world is depicted by a white or black author or any other ethnicity, it is that author’s imaginative vision of that world, but it is just that, a vision — not the vision or only vision. The danger, of course, is allowing for that singular lens to be our only understanding of lives we do not inhabit.
In middle school I had the pleasure of inhabiting the lives of Ponyboy and Sodapop, Johnny Cade and “Dally.” If we wanted, we had the option to own a copy of “The Outsiders” through those Scholastic Book order forms — forms full of appealing colors, pictures and book descriptions that made you want them all.
My parents ordered one copy for my twin sister and me to share, and I remember arguing with her when the Scholastic box of books arrived and the teacher stood in the front of the room, calling out the names of book recipients, over who got to claim it first. She won, but I still eventually made my way to the world of “The Outsiders” and was riveted (not much has changed for students 40 years later).
I also remember finding out the author, S.E. Hinton, is a female and was shocked, not in a ripped-off kind of way, but rather that a woman was so skilled in depicting one of the most popular adolescent male-driven stories of all time.
The content and this reader’s reaction to that content was not diminished because its author is a female. It was her imaginative storytelling of those boys’ experiences that has led to over 15 million copies being sold.
Now, make no mistake, “Trial” is, at times, an uncomfortable read. It is much better suited to be read amongst adult book clubs or a college civics/social justice class than a high school classroom. But Patterson’s storytelling skills, subject sensitivities and meticulous research — he spent significant time in Georgia and conducted over 50 interviews with a diverse cross-section of people immersed in its subject matter — are indisputable.
In an interview with LiveTalksLA, Patterson said, “If we choose to portray diverse characters, our singular obligation is to understand them as deeply as we try to understand ourselves, humbled by the awareness that the more their experiences transcend our own, the more work we must do.”
This is what makes storytelling so essential, regardless of race or gender, to one's imaginative being.
Brett Hiner is an English/language arts teacher at Wooster High School, where he also serves as the yearbook advisor and Drama Club advisor/director. If he’s not at work or doing something work related, he is typically annoying his children and/or wife. He can be emailed at workinprogressWWN@gmail.com.