Casey Cep: Furious Hours – Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee,

W. Heinemann/ Random House UK, 9781785150746, paperback

 

“Furious Hours” is a fascinating mixture of a book:  true crime reporting  about the murders of an alleged serial killer, the Reverend Willie Maxwell, his very own murder, his  lawyer ‘s Big Tom Radney’s  role in this Alabama drama. And last but not least bibliographical reportage of Harper Lee’s life (the reclusive author of “To Kill a Mockingbird" and childhood friend of Truman Capote) unearthing the last known research activities for a book she saw but was unable to write after having spent years of research on  Reverend Maxwell.  

This book reads like a thriller but is also a portrait of Alabama, the South and a biography of Harper Lee’s peculiar life.  I would say it is beneficial to have an interest in the author Harper Lee as 25 % of the book is about her, her research of this case and her plight to write a second bestseller after the gigantic success of “To Kill a Mockingbird”. 

“Furious Hours” opens with the thriller element of the book.  Several relatives including two wives of the African- American Reverend Maxwell are found dead, all having died under suspicious circumstances.  Law enforcement treated Maxwell as a suspect but is unable to nail him to any of these deaths.  What turned him into a key suspect is the fact that he had taken out life insurance on all these people unbeknownst to them, something that could be done years ago, making him the sole beneficiary in case of death.  Reading about the investigations into these deaths, one is speechless that no one could pin Maxwell down to these murders despite him having more than one motive.  Enter Tom Radney, his lawyer and a gregarious Alabama politician who defended him brilliantly in all these trials.  When one of the grieving relatives takes justice into his own hands, Tom Radney switches roles without blinking an eye ending up defending Reverend Maxwell’s killer.  These chapters alone make this book a mind boggling read.

I had read Marja Mills book “The Mockingbird Next Door”  about her friendship with Harper Lee and her sisters  a few years ago and was astonished to learn from Casey Cep that there had indeed been the start of a second book for Lee, not counting her original version of the Mockingbird, “Go Set a Watchman”, which was originally dropped but published after her death. Harper Lee dug deep and painstakingly into the Reverend Maxwell’s case, spending years of interviewing people associated with him and even living in Alexander City for some time to conduct her investigation.  She amassed tons of material but after years of trying to write “The Reverend” as she called the work in progress, she gave up and the book never materialized.

Casey Cep has done some very extensive, deep digging herself to come up with this mesmerizing story.  Hats off to her, I was absolutely fascinated by her discoveries and the stories she had to tell.