"It was, 'How could the wealthy decision-makers, living in their all-White suburbs make a decision that affects the lower-class neighborhoods without a vote?' There were people who felt that way. Some of the characters in his new book, like people he knew in real life, viewed the busing policy as a rights issue.
There was also this thing of, how do you reconcile good decent people who you know with what this brought out in them - the level of vitriol, the level of racism?" he said. The author recalled how his first conscious social and political thought was that it is in the best interest of the ruling class to keep the working class fighting among itself. "We were seeing things on the national news, we were seeing graffiti that was 'KKK,' 'Kill all the N-words.' This was common in my neighborhood and other working-class neighborhoods throughout the city and that's a lot to take in when you are nine years old." "That's when I learned what 'effigy' meant and to see these figures hung on poles and lit on fire was just medieval," Lehane said. Small Mercies is partly Lehane's attempt to make sense of a disturbing scene he saw when he and his father were in the family car and took a wrong turn into violent protests against the busing policy. I understand why it's sometimes necessary at the beginning, but once it becomes institutionalized, it's always a bad thing." "The enemy in a lot of my books is tribalism, and I understand how tribalism starts.
Ken Fen crossed the bridge and got out ," Lehane said. She passes along the same sins of racism and reductive thinking to her children," Lehane said of Mary Pat.Īlthough the book deals with difficult topics, the author's choice to wrap his story with a scene that features two characters of different races sitting down and sharing a drink while mourning their respective losses as the world around them burns is a salute to decency and a ray of light for readers.
At the same time, she is a woman who has been victimized her entire life, but then has the sin of victimization on her, as well. "God help you if you get on the wrong side of her. Mary Pat is written as a fierce, but damaged, woman who grew up in the low-income housing projects and knew mostly hardship and disappointment.Īll she wants is a better life for Jules. "They were products of abusive fathers, abusive husbands and they produced tough, abused kids. "I knew a lot of these women and, as time went on, I started to see the sadness," he said. The smart, hot-tempered and relentless character is inspired by the "bruisers" Lehane encountered in his younger years. "When you take someone like that and you give them nothing left to lose, then you have a very dangerous opponent on your hands - which is what I wanted." "Mary Pat, right from the beginning, her hands are tied," the 57-year-old author told UPI in a recent phone interview.
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