The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir

by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich

It is about a murder, it is about my family, it is about other families whose lives were touched by the murder. But more than that, much more than that, it is about how we understand our lives, the past, and each other. To do this, we all make stories.

Yeah, i think I'm going to like this...

[I]t is always possible that the solution to one mystery will solve another. —TRUMAN CAPOTE, IN COLD BLOOD

All of these possible causes are causes in fact. The causes in fact are endless. The idea of proximate cause is a solution. The job of the law is to figure out the source of the story, to assign responsibility. The proximate cause is the one the law says truly matters. The one that makes the story what it is.

I came here to help save the man on the screen. I came to help save men like him. I came because my ideals and who I am exist separately from what happened in the past. They must. If they don’t, what will my life hold?

But I look at the man on the screen, I feel my grandfather’s hands on me, and I know. Despite what I’ve trained for, despite what I’ve come here to work for, despite what I believe. I want Ricky to die.

She can’t just pretend none of that happened. She can’t. But of course—she can. I have changed my sister’s name in this book, out of respect for her choice, and as much as possible I have changed my other family members’ names and the names of some of the people in Ricky’s life. But I can’t bring myself to write a narrative that puts my experience alone in my family again. I won’t do on the page what was done in life.