Bette Greene's Blog: American Classic Novelist - Posts Tagged "stephan-jones"
THE DROWNING OF STEPHAN JONES: AIN’T NO WHO-DUNNIT…IT’S A WHY-DUNNIT!
Here’s the story behind the story. Although there was never any question as to whom the killers were, the district attorney gave the order: “No arrests. Not yet. Give the little perps time to go around town bragging about what big men and all they are.”
Great hordes of press, some as far away as Japan, came roaring into town jockeying for a seat in the courtroom. Would these three teenagers, they all wanted to know, be prosecuted as adults or juveniles. Was that important? Not to me, but certainly to the defendants because it could mean the difference between a “boys will be boys” slap-on-the-wrist or perhaps adjoining cells on death row.
Although the boys were given strict orders by their attorneys not to talk with press, one did. He was bribed by the pungent smell coming from my paper bag proclaiming:
“Sonny’s B-B-Q
We’re the best
Forget the rest”
Petey wiped his hands on his regulation prison shirt before charging into his sandwhich. “I’m not a bad person. Ask anybody who knows me. They’ll tell you. I’m not a bad person.”
“But, Petey, you did do something bad. You killed an innocent human being.”
He tossed his head back as locks of blond hair fell across his smooth forehead. “He wasn’t innocent! He was a sodomite! It’s even in the Bible. I got two sisters you know… one is only nine.”
“So? But I don’t—”
“Don’t you see it’s the job of us men to protect our kinfolks?”
“Are you saying Stephan Jones bothered your sister? Or maybe somebody else’s little sister?”
“Well, that’s what sodomites do, you know. If you went to Bible class you’d know that!”
Revered Ellis who was handsome enough to appear in toothpaste commercials greeted me at the door of Full of Faith Church. “Sorry about Petey, and I feel sorry for the whole family too cause they’re all good people. Give you the shirt off their backs. They all would.”
“Could you help me out here, Reverend Ellis? Petey still thinks that he was only doing God’s work.”
“What I preach is that we love the sinner, but we hate the sin because it’s the sin that keeps us separated from God.”
When The Drowning of Stephan Jones was published, it generated a lot of press of its own. Reviewers and readers alike seemed sometimes amazed and sometimes furious by the fact that there were more villains here than just these three hapless teenagers.
Nobody, absolutely nobody, was indifferent to this novel. Some said, “It’s about time.” But others disagreed saying that there is no time that’s the right time for this “terrible” book and a scheduled talk in Dallas is abruptly cancelled. Ditto is my address at a Bible college in Arkansas. In a front page story of the Boston Globe, Cardinal Bernard Law called me bizarre.
The American Library Association placed The Drowning of Stephan Jones on the hundred most challenged books in America. And that’s how the name Bette Greene joined Maya Angelou, Mark Twain and Harper Lee on this list of the 100 most challenged books in America.
Great hordes of press, some as far away as Japan, came roaring into town jockeying for a seat in the courtroom. Would these three teenagers, they all wanted to know, be prosecuted as adults or juveniles. Was that important? Not to me, but certainly to the defendants because it could mean the difference between a “boys will be boys” slap-on-the-wrist or perhaps adjoining cells on death row.
Although the boys were given strict orders by their attorneys not to talk with press, one did. He was bribed by the pungent smell coming from my paper bag proclaiming:
“Sonny’s B-B-Q
We’re the best
Forget the rest”
Petey wiped his hands on his regulation prison shirt before charging into his sandwhich. “I’m not a bad person. Ask anybody who knows me. They’ll tell you. I’m not a bad person.”
“But, Petey, you did do something bad. You killed an innocent human being.”
He tossed his head back as locks of blond hair fell across his smooth forehead. “He wasn’t innocent! He was a sodomite! It’s even in the Bible. I got two sisters you know… one is only nine.”
“So? But I don’t—”
“Don’t you see it’s the job of us men to protect our kinfolks?”
“Are you saying Stephan Jones bothered your sister? Or maybe somebody else’s little sister?”
“Well, that’s what sodomites do, you know. If you went to Bible class you’d know that!”
Revered Ellis who was handsome enough to appear in toothpaste commercials greeted me at the door of Full of Faith Church. “Sorry about Petey, and I feel sorry for the whole family too cause they’re all good people. Give you the shirt off their backs. They all would.”
“Could you help me out here, Reverend Ellis? Petey still thinks that he was only doing God’s work.”
“What I preach is that we love the sinner, but we hate the sin because it’s the sin that keeps us separated from God.”
When The Drowning of Stephan Jones was published, it generated a lot of press of its own. Reviewers and readers alike seemed sometimes amazed and sometimes furious by the fact that there were more villains here than just these three hapless teenagers.
Nobody, absolutely nobody, was indifferent to this novel. Some said, “It’s about time.” But others disagreed saying that there is no time that’s the right time for this “terrible” book and a scheduled talk in Dallas is abruptly cancelled. Ditto is my address at a Bible college in Arkansas. In a front page story of the Boston Globe, Cardinal Bernard Law called me bizarre.
The American Library Association placed The Drowning of Stephan Jones on the hundred most challenged books in America. And that’s how the name Bette Greene joined Maya Angelou, Mark Twain and Harper Lee on this list of the 100 most challenged books in America.
American Classic Novelist
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