Book Review: Small Mercies

 By Dennis Lehane

• Pub Date: 2023

• Genre: Historical fiction

• Where I bought this book: Barnes & Noble, Florence, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I read about the Boston busing crisis in Common Ground, by J. Anthony Lukas, so this one resonated with me

• Bookmark used: Hobart Book Village, in Hobart, N.Y., which I visited the summer of 2024   

 ********* 

    This novel, of course, takes as its theme the Boston busing crisis, in the summer of 1974, when a federal judge drew up a plan and ordered the Boston Public Schools to desegregate. 

    But it encompasses so much more: racism, the Boston Mafia, a family crisis, insular neighborhoods, drug addictions, poverty, and a hot, dry summer in a city already boiling over with racial turmoil.

    It's a rich character study of the Southie neighborhood, its denizens and its surroundings. It's moving, melancholy, sometimes funny, and a tale that reverberates today.

    It centers around Mary Patricia Fennessy, known to one and all as Mary Pat, a pillar of her South Boston community, a stout defender of her Southie heritage and all that entails. But as she gets older, having been abandoned by two husbands, seen one son fight in Vietnam and die from a drug addiction, and her only daughter in serious trouble, her rage ramps up. She begins asking questions.

    Is the Boston Mafia, led by Marty Butler and his men, a protector of Southie? Are the Black people over in Roxbury and Mattapan really just a bunch of lazy thugs? Is her Irish Catholic heritage, and its people, really something to lord over others? And most importantly: Did she raise her children right?   

    We get to know the leaders of the anti-busing brigade, some real and some fictional.  There's Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, whom they call Teddy, because he was one of them. But since he defended busing, they now call him a race traitor, and we see as they assault and spit on him during the demonstrations.

    And we learn about the ugliness of the neighborhood kids who celebrate racism, and the Black folks who survive it. (Well, not all of them survive. There the mysterious death of one Black kid who was in the wrong neighborhood at the wrong time, and the impact it had on Black people, white people, and the cops who investigate it.)

    Lehane, born and reared in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood, has written several novels exploring his hometown and its surroundings. His genres have included mysteries and crime, and topics have included violence, loyalty, and a gritty underworld. This one has them all.

Book Review: The Wordy Shipmates

•  Author: Sarah Vowell
• Pub Date: 2008

• Where I bought this book: Joseph-Beth, Norwood, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: I heard the author on NPR once, and she seemed amazing 

*******

    You might not think that a history book exploring the lives of some of the earliest immigrants to the United States -- the somber Puritans who came to Boston in the 1600s because the religious figures in England were not strict enough -- would make for a witty, rollicking tale of adventure and petty in-fighting.

    But you would be wrong.

    Vowell's tale, complete with the letters and journals of the men -- and the few women -- who made an impact on the Massachusetts Bay Colony, is a joy to read. It's history come alive, as reported by a somewhat snarky, knowledgeable reporter who, with a wry grin sadly shakes her head at the goings on.

    She brings in popular culture -- from the Brady Bunch to Bruce Springsteen, to Thanks, an oddball situation comedy that lasted six episodes in 1999 -- to help show how we've gotten it all wrong and entirely misunderstand the point of the first English colonists and their relationships with each other and the native culture. When one of them, John Winthrop, spoke about building a "city on a hill," they also missed the point, much like candidate Ronald Reagan misinterpreted Winthrop and Springsteen's Born in the U.S.A. in 1984.    

In the U.S.A., we want to sing the chorus and ignore the verses, ignore the blues.

      So, Vowell aims to set us straight. Chockful of primary sources, she covers the Puritans' voyage from their leaving of England in 1630 to their first years in what they called New England. The title is acknowledgement that the Puritans weren't stuffy, ignorant people, (well, they tended to be stuffy, but ...) but serious men and women who knew their religion, had a specific interpretation of their Bible, and could argue and explain exactly what they wanted and why. Along with fighting evil and burning Indians, they wrote and collected books and created colleges of learning.

    And they did it their way.

A trip to the Boston Marathon

So, I spent a few days last week up in Boston, watching the Marathon, exploring bookstores, and seeing the sights. Unfortunately, time did not allow for a full viewing of the available bookstores. But I did enjoy the marathon and other activities, and here are some of the thoughts I came away with.

Boston is a long drive: On the way back, I broke the 1,000-mile-a-day barrier. I drove 1,000.1 miles from our hotel in the suburb of Braintree, Mass., to drop off my daughter at college in Morehead, Ky., and then home to Edgewood, Ky. It took 19 1/2 hours, from 4 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.Two of those hours were spent sitting in a traffic jam in Nitro, W.Va.

 My mileage, just down the block from my home in Edgewood, Ky.

The MBTA: What a great public transportation system. The trains run constantly, and the routes are easy to navigate.

The Charlie Card:  I love the fact that the system's pass, which you can buy anywhere, for any amount of cash, and use it to pay your fare, is named after the old folk song, "Charlie on the MTA"  Signs in every station explain the history of the song and its connection with the system.

Mile 17: The purpose of my family trip was to see my daughter run the Boston Marathon. We decided to watch from the Newton Fire Station at the corner of Route 16, where the runners turn onto Commonwealth Avenue just after the 17-mile mark. It was a great choice -- just before Heartbreak Hill, two-thirds of the way through, and my daughter was happy to see familiar faces. It was easy to get there on the MBTA, had a nice, but not overwhelming crowd, and snacks and portaporties were available at the fire department.

  The elite men -- including winner Geoffrey Kirui (far left) and runner-up Galen Rupp (middle) -- just past Mile 17

Crazy streets: While the public transit was great, the surface streets are incomprehensible. Narrow and winding, with five- and six-way intersections, it's easy to get lost, and easy to understand the city's massive traffic problems. We chose not to drive in the city. Another good choice.

Compact city: It is, however, a great walking city. A couple of miles and you can see many of the attractions, from Fenway Park, to the Boston Commons, to Faneuil Hall, where I bought some tea at a store named Revolutionary Boston.

                                   The Irish Famine Memorial, not far from Faneuil Hall

My Thai Vegan Cafe: A great little restaurant we found in Chinatown, as we wandered around after the Marathon. My younger daughter, a vegan, was happy. She could eat everything on the menu, including the chocolate cake.