Woychuk is an unusually candid New York Citybased lawyer who specializes in work with the criminally insane. He is an advocate for patients' rights at Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center, a maximum security hospital for the dangerously mentally ill, men and women who often have a history of violence. Woychuk came to this unusually specialized practice as a result of a desire to use his skills in the courtroom and his dissatisfaction with endless days of paper-chasing in a corporate law firm. Here he relates six cases from his extensive files (over 300 cases) to illustrate various aspects of how the law treats the mentally ill. The clients he represented in these cases range from an infamous murderer who allegedly cooked and ate the heart of his victim to a quiet, gentle Sudanese whose biggest problem was that the psychiatrist who examined him knew even less English than the patient did. Finally, the author offers a lengthy essay on how to change a system that clearly has serious flaws. Woychuk is admirably frank about his tactics, his profession, his shortcomings, and his doubts (``I live with the painful knowledge that I am somehow complicit in the horrible acts some of my clients commit after I . . . help them get released''). Along the way, he offers insights into the workings of a trial lawyer's mind (``Lawyers strive to make the facts fit their theory of the case, not the other way around'') that should have extra resonance for Court TV addicts. Perhaps the book's greatest contribution is to show how little the criminally mentally ill resemble the monsters of serial-killer fiction and film; even the scariest of the clients Woychuk describes began his life as an abused child, the common denominator in almost all such cases. An intelligently written, often riveting collection of ``war stories.''
Pub Date: Feb. 15, 1996
ISBN: 0-684-87438-5
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Free Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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