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A True Story of Murder and Mercy
by Alex Mar
A masterful, revelatory work of literary non-fiction about a teenage girl's shocking crime—and its extraordinary aftermath
On a spring afternoon in 1985 in Gary, Indiana, a fifteen-year-old girl kills an elderly woman in a violent home invasion. In a city with a history of racial tensions and white flight, the girl, Paula Cooper, is Black, and her victim, Ruth Pelke, is white and a beloved Bible teacher. The press swoops in.
When Paula is sentenced to death, no one decries the impending execution of a tenth grader. But the tide begins to shift when the victim's grandson Bill forgives the girl, against the wishes of his family, and campaigns to spare her life. This tragedy in a midwestern steel town soon reverberates across the United States and around the world—reaching as far away as the Vatican—as newspapers cover the story on their front pages and millions sign petitions in support of Paula.
As Paula waits on death row, her fate sparks a debate that not only animates legal circles but raises vital questions about the value of human life: What are we demanding when we call for justice? Is forgiveness an act of desperation or of profound bravery? As Bill and Paula's friendship deepens, and as Bill discovers others who have chosen to forgive after terrible violence, their story asks us to consider what radical acts of empathy we might be capable of.
In Seventy Times Seven, Alex Mar weaves an unforgettable narrative of an act of violence and its aftermath. This is a story about the will to live—to survive, to grow, to change—and about what we are willing to accept as justice. Tirelessly researched and told with intimacy and precision, this book brings a haunting chapter in the history of our criminal justice system to astonishing life.
"An engrossing study of faith, forgiveness, and justice ... Deeply reported and vividly written, this is a harrowing and thought-provoking portrait of crime and punishment." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Mar's expansive, humanitarian legal history is also an investigation of belief ... This is an unsettling look at the recent past and a profoundly affecting read." —Booklist (starred review)
"A probing examination of the intersection of race, crime, and punishment." —Kirkus Reviews
"Well-written, well-researched, and worth being added to a true-crime collection." —Library Journal
"The only way this country will ever free itself of the moral stain that is capital punishment is through stories like the one Mar tells in Seventy Times Seven: of individual compassion and moral courage." —Literary Hub
"Alex Mar's bold yet sensitive account of one of America's youngest death row inmates—and the people whose lives she forever changed—is intimately reported, deeply moving, and unforgettable." —Robert Kolker, New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road
"In Seventy Times Seven, Alex Mar has reached back to the 1980s to explore a shocking murder case. But this book is not only about crime and punishment; it raises urgent questions that are common to all of us—about how children develop into social beings, about who is capable of rehabilitation, and about how we mend the damage that runs through generations. Deeply researched and deeply felt, Seventy Times Seven is an absorbing work of social history and a story about the mystery and miracle of forgiveness. It is a book of awesome scope, and it deserves to be read with attention." —Hilary Mantel, Booker Prize-winning author of the Wolf Hall trilogy
"Seventy Times Seven is a devastating and essential book, a meticulous deconstruction of the social fears and personal calculations that built and still uphold the death penalty in America. A brilliant reporter and empathetic narrator, Alex Mar has written the truest kind of crime drama, unafraid of rendering our narratives about justice less comforting." —Sierra Crane Murdoch, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Yellow Bird
"Alex Mar's Seventy Times Seven is a monumental achievement, probing the toughest questions that all nonfiction crime narratives must ask and emerging with a story of profound moral inquiry, the limits of where we can find justice, and the power of compassion, often in the most surprising quarters. When we wish to understand ourselves and society at our worst and at our best, look no further than this book." —Sarah Weinman, author of The Real Lolita and Scoundrel
This information about Seventy Times Seven was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Alex Mar is the author of Witches of America, which was a New York Times Notable Book and Editors' Pick. Her work has appeared in New York Magazine, Wired, The New York Times Book Review, and The Guardian, among many other outlets, as well as The Best American Magazine Writing. She has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award in Feature Writing, and she is the director of the feature-length documentary American Mystic. She lives in the Hudson Valley and New York City.
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