Open Mic Night at The Mercury Cafe

image from blogs.artvoice.com

   Last night at Open Mic Night at The Mercury Cafe in downtown Denver!
   One night a month they invite people to read flash fiction. There is a featured reader and the rest of the evening they open up to anyone who wants to read their work. You sign up when you arrive and read in the order of the signup.
   I used to write poetry and do readings both in performance and open mic settings. But that was many years ago. Many years ago. I always enjoyed reading for an audience, so when my daughter asked if I wanted to go with her to The Mercury Cafe for their flash fiction reading, I . . .
(Okay, here is where my writer self kicks in. Did I "jump at the chance" or "embraced the opportunity" or "eagerly accept?")
    . . . I asked when and where. I'd never heard of The Mercury Cafe. Then, armed with that information, I called my husband to see if he could hold the fort (cliches are my life) while I went into Denver for the evening.
   All those many years ago, one of the first things my then-to-be husband did with me was go to poetry readings and take pictures. To be honest, I think he was relieved that he would have to stay home with my dad.

image from heritagepioneer.com

   This is the room where we read. This picture was obviously taken in the daytime. The readings started at 7:30, well after dark. The stage was reasonably well-lit, but the rest of the room was pretty dark.

   The curtains behind the stage are not blue. They're red. Like I said, I'd never been there before so naturally I wore red. I'm sure I blended into the background beautifully. With my brilliant white hair, I probably looked like a talking head.

   I've read from a stage many times, but never to a darkened room. I've always been able to see the audience. I like seeing the audience. I read to people not to the dark. The picture at the top of this blog post was pretty much like what I was seeing as I read. A bright spotlight, a microphone, and darkness. As a sci-fi writer and reader you'd think vast, empty darkness would suit me just fine. But what interests me about outer space are people in outer space. 

   And then, and then. The emcee announced that the theme for the evening was The Weird. Hmmm. I brought "Dammit Jason" to read. It's from a blog post back in October of last year. You can read it here. Not my idea of weird. Still, if few people in the audience are familiar with the rural South, it could seem weird. And The Mercury Cafe is in Denver, Colorado -- not rural or Southern. Plus most of the  audience are somehow connected to university life, either as professors or students, so . . . .

   So I read it into the darkness, in the face of that spotlight. And they laughed and applauded. It was good. And I'm going to do it again.

   But I won't wear red.

Neil Gaiman Book Signing

   It was a dark and stormy night. That would have been the perfect beginning for a Neil-Gaiman-book-signing sort of day. But it wasn’t. February 6 dawned clear and beautiful with the promise of mid-60s for a high temperature, a good twenty degrees above the average for a February day on the Front Range.

   For those of you who have not read Neil Gaiman let me suggest Stardust, a fairy tale for adults. It has a hero, evil nobles, ghosts, pirates, witches, and a fallen star. And humor. (The 2007 movie of the same name has Robert De Niro as the pirate Captain Shakespeare. And his immortal line “I'm taking the girl to my cabin, and mark my words anyone who disturbs me for the next few hours will get the same treatment.)

   American Gods, another of my favorites, will give you things to think about long after you finish the book.

   But to quote Arlo Guthrie “That’s not what I come here to talk about.”

   Being a new émigré to Colorado and having acquired early on a strong aversion to traveling I-25 to or from the Denver area, I was not looking forward to the two-hour drive on said highway to Ft. Collins. My daughter, who inspired me to make the trip, is an avid Gaiman reader and fan. After all, he has written episodes for the Doctor Who television series. (Matt Smith is her Doctor.)

   Everything was in place. Four books waited for me at The Old Firehouse Book Store. Including Gaiman’s recently released Trigger Warning, a collection of short fiction and poetry which was a required purchase to get into the book signing. Since I am currently attempting to write saleable short fiction and I admire Gaiman’s work, the requirement was painless.

   And being me, one book was not enough. The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Stardust, and The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish also waited for me. To be more precise, for my grandchildren – Martha, John Riley, and Silas respectively.

   The bookstore doors were scheduled to open at 4 p.m. We arrived at 3:45 and found a line winding around the store, down the alley, and around the block. It was not an orderly, single file line. It bulged here and there to three or four or six or ten people wide. Young people, old people, tattooed and pierced people. All carrying books. (We had been told he would sign the books we bought from the bookstore plus three brought from home. Grace didn’t buy a new book but we counted the two she brought from home as mine. I think a lot of people did likewise.)

   From the end of the line I called the bookstore to confirm that my pre-purchased books were there and that he would sign them in spite of the number of people waiting in line. What I was hoping was that those people who had bought multiple books would get special privilege and go to the front of the line. She assured me that he would sign books until the very last one, no matter how long it took and they had my books waiting for me.

   My Dad’s cousin lives in Ft. Collins and we’d been saying since we moved to Colorado that we’d come up and see her. I couldn’t go to Ft. Collins and not visit, so I called her. She asked us to come over after we got our books signed. I explained the situation. The line behind us had lengthened considerably after our arrival. I wasn’t about to lose my place in line.

   So Helen and Charlie came and stood in line and visited with me for a while. The young man (He didn’t like American Gods that much.) behind us in line asked me how they would find me among all those people. I pointed to my white hair. There were people in line with more brightly colored hair than mine, but not that many of us white-haired people. Besides I’d told her which corner we were on.

   Colorado’s sun is fierce. As long as it shines you will always be comfortable. So I had left my warm cape in the car. Did I mention that we had difficulty finding a parking place and had to park several blocks away? Helen and Charlie left and the sun set. And the temperature began to drop.

   It got cold. I had very carefully chosen my clothes. Black slacks, black knee-high stockings, my Washington, D.C. open-toed shoes (that’s a whole ‘nother story) a sleeveless black blouse, a forest green over shirt with the sleeves fashionably rolled to just below the elbow, and a thin black scarf shot through with brightly colored metallic threads.

   I got cold. My back hurt. My knees hurt. But I would not leave my place in line.

The people around us were worth standing in line to visit. The young man behind me was a junior in high school. Some of his friends had skipped class to get in line early. Smart kids. His parents were also somewhere in the line well behind us. They dutifully brought him food and drink.

   Half of one couple – she was a molecular biologist and he a chemistry teacher – went to their car to recharge their cell phones while she stood in line. They were from a town up near the Wyoming border and had had trouble finding a parking place, too. He came back with a partially charged phone and a $75 parking ticket.

   At one point we found ourselves waiting in front of a local winery. Unfortunately, Ft. Collins is narrow-minded about drinking wine while standing on the sidewalk. The folks in Louisiana definitely have the right attitude about public drinking. And it doesn’t get nearly so cold there.

   Grace went in search of provisions and brought me hot coffee. It felt so good just to hold it. And, in keeping with Gaiman’s penchant for fantasy, I imagined climbing into that paper cup, immersing myself in warm, wonderful coffee.

   I didn’t know Ft. Collins had that many people. But I am glad to report that the people there read. They also have a wonderful sense of humor. Quite a few Friday-night-out-people asked what was going on. One of the guys in line (probably 40-years-old or older) cheerfully answered that Justin Bieber was inside.

   I could go on and on. Suffice it to say, by the time we got into the warm bookstore, I had consumed hot coffee, hot cocoa, and hot tea. Oh, yes and a slice of garlic bread from a pizza place we eventually stood in front of.

   At 11:35 p.m. I was standing in front of Neil Gaiman and he was signing my four books. By then, my sleeves were rolled down as far as they would go and I had that sparkly scarf wrapped around my head and neck.

   He signed Grace’s books AND her laptop.

   He was cheerful and friendly and asked how I was after standing in line so long. And him having been signing things since 4 p.m. (Including at least one pair of red roller skates that I’d seen two hours earlier.) He still had as many more of us with books to sign. They said there were around 2000 people who had purchased books, from as far away as South Dakota.

   His discomfort must surely have been greater than mine. I was through and he was not. This is a price of success that I never imagined. 

   I wonder if he’s like me and just wanted to tell a few good stories.

  

A Scene without a Story -- fiction

“You ever see a calf born?”

She took a deep breath. “Never saw anything born.” And she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She thought births involved lots of blood and pain. Neither high on her bucket list.

 “Should I get out with you? Or would you rather I wait in the truck?”

 “Suit yourself. I’ll set my galoshes out in case you decide to come in. Those shoes won’t do you much good in the barn.”

She winced. Her good shoes. One heel already broken.

“Won’t it bother the mother to have strange people there?” she asked.

“I doubt it.” He climbed out of the truck. “If you’re quiet, she won’t pay much attention.”

She did not wait well. Not for seating in restaurants. Not on line for movies. She wore a slinky little black dress, its daringly low neckline now hidden under Jack’s rough canvas barn coat. Which also covered her expensive jasmine scent with his smell of sweat and hay and heaven-knew-what-else. She’d planned on dinner and dancing with Drew, not delivering a calf on a farm in the middle of nowhere with Jack.

A cold wind rocked the truck. The barn or the truck? At least the barn would be warm.  She hoped,

Jack was right. His rubber boots were better than gimping in on one high-heeled shoe.

A man wearing a coat like the one she wore, led a large, black and white cow into the brightly lit barn.

“This is Trey. He’s the boss.” Jack inclined his head toward her. “This is Gina. She’s riding shotgun with me tonight.”

“Hey, ma’am.” Trey looked her up and down. “I’ll fix you a clean place to sit.”

Jack nodded toward the cow. “Get her into the chute first, so I can examine her.”

The cow walked into a metal contraption. Trey pushed a lever causing it to close firmly against the cow.

“She doesn’t mind being restrained?” she asked.

“She’s used to it.”

Jack washed the cow’s rear end with soap and water, then his hands. He was drying his hands when Trey brought a clean white bucket and tipped it upside down for her to sit on.

The cow didn’t seem interested in what any of them were doing, not even Jack. He pulled on a plastic glove long enough to reach his shoulder. He rubbed some kind of clear oil or lotion on his gloved hand and arm and curled the cow’s tail up over her back. He then put his hand into her backside.

Oh, my God. What was he doing?

The cow shifted back and forth on her back feet then stood still and seemed to tense up.

“It’s breech,” Jack said. “I’ll try to turn it.”

She didn’t know how long he worked trying to turn the calf. Probably not as long as it seemed – the whole time up to his shoulder inside the cow, sweat beading on his forehead. The cow, stoic, quiet.

She wanted to look away, but she couldn’t. The clean white bucket sat forgotten. “Doesn’t that hurt?” she asked.

“Doesn’t seem to hurt her, but I can tell you it’s not comfortable for me. The contractions . . .”

Finally he withdrew his arm from the cow and peeled off the glove. “Calf’s alive. Too big, though. We need to do a c-section.”

The cow washing and hand washing started again. This time on the cow’s side.

Gina needed a cigarette.

Back at the truck, she retrieved a cigarette and her lighter from her purse. With the wind, she couldn’t get the cigarette lit. It would be easy if Jack would let her smoke in his truck. She decided she’d rather see what he was doing anyway. Maybe she wanted to see a newborn. Even a calf. She put the cigarette back in her purse.

 As she hurried into the barn, Jack lifted the calf out of the cow by its back feet. It was so big. How could a cow carry something so big inside her?

Covered in a thick, pale membrane, the calf hung limp from Jack’s hands. He lay it on a bed of hay.

“Trey, hand her one of those gunny sacks.”

“Is it dead?” she asked. Her chest so tight it hurt. She’d been afraid of what a birth might involve, but she’d never imagined this. This was horrible. She’d never touched anything dead before.

Jack tore the tissue away from the calf’s face and cleared its nose and mouth of mucous. The baby lay unmoving.

“Amniotic bag,” he explained. “It’s a heifer. Trey’ll show you what to do while I finish with momma.”

“A heifer? Is that good?” she asked.

Trey laughed. “On a dairy farm, girl’s are always good.” He scrubbed the baby with the coarse bags. “Like this to get her started.”

As big as it was, the calf felt small under Gina’s hands. Its warm body covered with soft, wet, black and white hair. She thought it would smell bad, like manure and urine, but it didn’t. And there wasn’t a lot of blood.

“Breathe, baby, breathe,” she whispered.

The creature sputtered and struggled. It cried out. The cow, though she’d seemed disinterested throughout the process, mooed back. The feeling in Gina’s chest transformed from shrinking in horror to the swell of wonder and pride. Her face was going to be sore, she was smiling so hard.

Jack finished with the cow and let her out of the chute.

The three of them watched without a word as the cow licked her calf all over. The new baby got her rear end up and wagged her tail like she knew she’d done something amazing. Then she fell in a heap. After several failed attempts, she stood, wobbling on tip toe. So lightly touching the ground she looked like she might float away.

“She’s beautiful.” With the rough fabric of Jack’s barn coat, Gina brushed away tears.

“And healthy,” Jack said wiping off his instruments.

“Want a beer?” Trey asked.

To Be or Not to Be Sad -- an essay

image from en.people.cn

   This morning my dad slept late. As he took his morning pill, I commented that the snow that had been forecast for today was running late and wouldn’t be here until tomorrow. He grumped that he’d just as soon not have any. I asked him what he’d like for breakfast – egg and toast or oatmeal. I know he likes both. He said it didn’t matter. He just wanted to get it over.

   That’s it. I’ve had enough and, like the line from Network, I’m not going to take it anymore.

   My father lives with my husband and me. He’ll be 90 years old in May. As with any almost nonagenarian, he has some physical and mental limitations. He can’t walk as far as he used to, though he still walks around the block – with his cane. He’s forgotten many things, but because he knew more than most people to begin with, he still knows more than the majority of people who live in this block that he walks around.

   He listens to conservative radio talk shows practically twenty-four hours a day. Where they argue the world is going to hell in a hand basket and it’s all because of Obama Care and illegal aliens. Not that TV is any better with its Judge this or that and Maury Povich. Even Dr. Phil. None of which Daddy watches. (Let me give him credit. He does like reruns of the old Andy Griffith show. If you haven’t watched it in a while, you might check it out. Its humor is gentle and Andy is thoughtful and kind.)

   Okay. So maybe Daddy’s depressed. Not unusual for people his age and we have had some dreary days weather-wise. It is winter. Maybe sadness is like mercury or lead poisoning, it can build up in you over the years. Daddy was a child during The Depression and The Dust Bowl. He came of age when the whole world was going to war and participated in that war as a very young adult. As bad as the world was then, he seems to think the world is worse now.

   Maybe it’s because so many people he’s known and loved are gone. Like all of us, he has hopes and dreams that fade or have become memories that fade.

   Everything changes. Most beyond understanding. Simple things like communications. You can walk around the world while talking on your cell phone without being tethered to a telephone line. You can cook without a flame. You can travel from Denver to Oklahoma City in an hour and 35 minutes, maybe faster if the jet stream is going your way. To the Moon from Earth in 8 hours and 35 minutes like the New Horizons probe on its way to Pluto. Many of these changes may be unfathomable, but they’re also amazing and wonderful.

   It’s easy to find ourselves surrounded by negativity. Negativity is what defines news. Sunday is the Super Bowl. The winners won’t get nearly as much air time as whatever riots break out in their home city in honor of celebration. (Though with Seattle and Foxborough, MA, maybe that won’t be the case.) We may have to content ourselves with ‘Deflate Gate’ for our Super Bowl negativity.

   And there’s war. This war or that war. Deaths from war are always awful, a blight on the human condition. 
   A little history here: In the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression if you’re from Mississippi) 214,938 Americans died in combat. 400,000 to 500,000 died from other causes, like accidents and disease. World War I took 53,402 American lives in combat and 63,114 from other causes. (Of course some say we were a little late getting into that one.) WWII had 291,557 combat deaths and 113,842 from other causes. The War on Terror (Afghanistan and Iraq) has had 5,281 American combat deaths and 1,432 from other causes. (Information from Wikipedia)

   Any death by combat is too many. But look at these figures. There is something striking besides the horrifying numbers and the significant reduction in the numbers between the Civil War and The War on Terror. The war deaths caused by ‘other.’ Deaths due to accidents and disease attest to the remarkable achievements humanity has made in medicine. This is positive. Not that I’m advocating going to war to advance medicine.

   Arguably I (and by default my dad) live in the most beautiful place in the world with its snow-capped Rocky Mountains and unlimited skies. But, of course, Southeast Arkansas must be the most beautiful place in the Spring with its azaleas and wisteria and the deep green light of the piney woods. And Logan County, Oklahoma, in the Fall with a brilliant yellow cottonwood in the valley spreading sunshine even on rainy days.

   The point is: if we are sad we have an antidote right at hand. No matter where we live or what kind of work we do, who we live with or what kind of movies we watch, or who our parents or children are there is always something good we can choose to see or hear or touch or smell or taste or remember or think about.

   So for Daddy, I’m assigning him a daily task. He is to find at least three things in his life for which he can be grateful. I’m going to do it, too. And today the first thing on my list is my Daddy.

My Daddy

Portrait by Bob O'Daniel

Educating Americans, the Shocking Failure -- An Essay

image from brainyquotes.com

I woke up this morning feeling fine. We had 47 degrees at 6 a.m. That's a good way to start the day. Then my husband told me about an article in this morning's Washington Post.

A national survey by Oklahoma State University's Food Science Department found that more than 80% of the American public would support mandatory labeling for foods containing DNA. The information included about DNA in the survey question is all completely true, but it is presented in a way that would sound frightening to a reader who does not know what DNA is. Apparently the vast majority of survey respondents do not know what DNA is.

This should be taken as an indictment of our education system. I do not know if biology is required for high school graduation. If it isn’t, it should be. I had high school biology in the 1960s and DNA was not mentioned, but in college it was. Scientists were just beginning to understand DNA. In 1962 Watson and Crick received the Nobel Prize for their work with DNA, so I don’t know how many public school biology teachers knew much about it then. Which brings up the question of continuing education for school teachers. Is it required even after they get their Masters? And does that continuing ed have to be in the field they’re teaching?

The responsibility for education does not fall solely on teachers. If we didn’t learn it from them, we have a responsibility to learn it on our own. And the world’s knowledge keeps growing. Even after we leave school. The resources for our own continuing ed are more available to us than they’ve ever been in human history. Pluto is no longer classified as a planet. Why not? Stem cell therapies are being used to treat various forms of cancer. Why?

If we like Dancing with the Stars, that’s fine, but just like eating burgers and fries is just fine, we need fruit and veggies for a healthy body. And we need healthy food for our minds. Watch Nova. Listen to Star Talk. Read a book. Google it.

When we get into the habit of exploring things we were just wondering about, we’re feeding our minds and learning to recognize that hunger for knowledge. We’ll soon discover that that hunger pops up more often than we ever imagined.

Flip a switch and turn on the light. Where did those electrons that are lighting our room actually come from and how did they get here? Read Isaac Asimov’s Atom. (What? You didn’t know he wrote anything but Science Fiction? Which, by the bye, is worth a read, too.) Exploring electricity, we’ll run into the names of Edison, Westinghouse, Tesla. Check them out.

Why don’t you ever see crows dead on the highway? Are they too smart to play in the road? How smart are they? Watch the documentary A Murder of Crows originally shown on PBS’s Nature. Now available at www.youtube.com/watch?v=s472GjbLKQ4. That’s right, youtube has things other than people and cats being dumb and cute, respectively.

Why do some people let their small children run loose in restaurants? Hmmmm. I don’t think Google can answer that satisfactorily. We’d probably have to ask those people and that might get us a few choice words we don’t need to look up.

Ask a question. Learn a new word. Expand your mental horizons.

And keep in mind, if it ain’t got DNA, it ain’t food. It might be a food supplement, but it ain’t food.

Style vs. Story -- an essay

Jackson Pollock,

image from westpacificview.com

My husband recently finished reading Cormac McCarthy’s Border Trilogy. If you’ve been following my blog very long, you know I’m a big fan of those three books. My husband is not only widely read, but well-read so I value his opinion.

The Border Trilogy? He liked them. After he got past McCarthy’s style.

McCarthy does not use standard punctuation. For someone who not only knows the basic rules of punctuation, but respects the role of rules in controlling chaos, this can interrupt the flow of the story.

Much of McCarthy’s stories are in dialogue for which he uses few or no attributions, making it sometimes difficult to know who’s speaking. Again, because the reader may have to go back quite a ways to figure out who’s saying what, the story is interrupted.

McCarthy writes run-on sentences that would give Henry James pause. And yes, by the end of the book, McCarthy the story-teller becomes McCarthy the Philosopher with a capital P.

All this being said, why did my husband like the books? For the same reasons I did. The characters, the setting, and the stories. McCarthy does those three things so well, that many of us readers overlook (and in some instances, overcome) his style.

Not everyone is willing or able to get past a writer’s style to get to the good parts.

How many of us were introduced to Shakespeare in school? And haven’t touched him since.  

How was that introduction made? Through reading. Keeping in mind that Shakespeare wrote plays and poems in the styles of plays and poems. To make things more uncomfortable we were subjected to that form of torture peculiar to traditional English teachers – divvying up the script among students who then read their parts cold. Not only are the students reading their parts unrehearsed, they are reading them in what amounts to a foreign language with which they have little familiarity.

(If you could see me now, you’d see my hands thrown into the air – whether in exasperation or supplication even I can’t tell.)

And Shakespeare’s characters and settings and, best of all, his stories are lost to his style.

Okay, so sometimes you have to do reading differently. Shakespeare, we should watch performed by qualified actors under the tutelage of good directors. There are numerous DVDs available from professionals and wonderful productions by college and high school drama departments throughout the English speaking world.

Charles Dickens is another writer we’re introduced to in school. And seldom, if ever, read again. I very early on discovered that I could follow Charles Dickens if I read him out loud or at least heard him as I read silently. But he wrote for pre-television readers. His wonderful stories were produced chapters at a time in periodicals. People would get the newest installment and gather together in their living room and listen to someone read aloud to them. So, in a way, these are performance pieces, too. Dickens, language sounds like the story he’s telling. He paints pictures with his descriptions and dialogue and even the names he chooses for his characters. We are transported into his stories. If we do not read them in our modern way of reading which is somehow fast – more like we’re watching a movie.

I couldn’t read James Joyce. And I can’t stand being left out. I had to find a way into his stories. Then I discovered his work on audio-books. By a reader who has a slight Irish accent. Of course! Joyce’s stories are all inside his head and he’s Irish. So I experience his stories inside my head. With a slight Irish accent.

 Generally speaking, my husband (and he is not alone in this) is of the opinion that a writer whose style makes the story difficult to read is ostentatious, arrogant, and a waste of the reader’s time. There are too many good stories out there and too little time to read them. Why waste that valuable time reading a writer who is more focused on his style than his story?

     My opinion? I’m still working on Faulkner.

Justice -- an essay

According to the American Heritage Dictionary the first definition of the word justice is “…fairness.” The second is “The principle of moral rightness; equity.” The third is “…fair treatment and due reward in accordance with honor, standards, or law.” And the fourth is “conformity with truth, fact, or sound reason.”

Fair? What if you hit Millie with your car and she dies? Completely by accident, you understand. You were driving within the speed limit. You were not impaired by drink or drugs or cell phone or rowdy children in the back seat. She stepped in front of you and you hadn’t time to stop. For the purposes of this essay we won’t even consider the question of fairness to Millie.

Because you were in no way at fault for Millie’s death, you have moral rightness on your side and equity would require that you be absolved of any responsibility for Millie’s death.

If Millie were Joe’s pet of ten years, morally all you would be required to do would be to apologize to Joe. You could also offer to pay a token amount to cover Joe’s loss or replace Millie. And maybe that would be due reward – especially if Joe had other pets he liked better or he had family and friends who would continue to provide companionship.

But what if the situation is more complex? Millie was Joe’s only friend in the world? Because Millie was not a human being, you will not be required to answer to the law for her death, nor will Joe have recourse to civil law. He cannot sue you for everything you’ve got. You receive fair treatment in accordance with honor, standards, or law. But he’s lost everything important to him. Will your apology and offer of money be due reward for Joe?  

Or what if Millie was Joe’s wife of fifty-two years? Or Joe’s mother and only support? Or Joe’s only child? Even if the law determines you were not at fault in any way. That it was truly an accident. Something beyond your control. It might take weeks or months. Can that be fair to you? Your life is on hold until the situation can be resolved. However it is resolved can the loss of Millie be fair to Joe?

Finally comes the question of conformity with truth, fact, or sound reason. The truth is that you happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The fact is that Millie is dead and sound reason holds that nothing will change that. You can’t un-be at the moment of impact. Joe cannot un-lose Millie. Can there be justice?

Does this mean justice only happens in trivial cases? Or in our imaginations?

In murder mysteries we almost always find out who dunnit and we end the books assured that the perpetrator will be brought to justice. I think that’s what I like so much about John Lescroart’s novels. (That and the fact that they’re well-written.) And when the hero is involved in something that seems right but against the law, he gets safely out of it. But then we run into the Italian justice system as Donna Leon writes it and even though her indefatigable Commissario Guido Brunetti identifies the baddies they don’t get their comeuppance because of who they are or who their family is.

In what is considered literary fiction justice happens even less often. Steinbeck’s Goad family in The Grapes of Wrath finds no promised land. McCarthy’s cowboys in the Border Trilogy don’t find true love and live happily ever after. Unfortunately these injustices, as uncomfortable as they make us, seem more true to life.

Maybe justice is just a human construct to give us hope and keep us trying.