Penal Fires

Description

Penal Fires is a psychological mystery of murder, reconciliation, romance, and revenge inspired by the real life bombing of Sterling Hall on the campus of the University of Wisconsin in 1970. Set in Madison, Wisconsin, a midwestern city notorious for its history of violent anti-Vietnam war protests, the novel portrays the exploits of ex-con, John Hartway, paroled after ten years for his anit-war protest crimes., who is trying to restore the shattered fragments of his life after his incarceration. One evening on his way to a staff meeting at the “Alternative Left,” a local newspaper, he stumbles upon the tail end of a murder of a street person in an alley just off the city’s Capitol Square.

Harassed by the local police and plagued by nightmares from his prison past, John tries to dismiss the incident he witnessed as an isolated incident until he meets a second mental patient whose burned features resemble those of the man Hartway saw murdered. A drive-by attempt on this second mental patient’s life leads him to a lethal blond, a powerful rival, a deadly prison cult, and more murders.

Will John uncover who is responsible to these murders before the police add another crime to his rap sheet? All the evidence seems to point to the psychiatric institute run by his father to whom Hartway hasn’t spoken since his first arrest ten years earlier. To reach him while evading the police and learn the truth, Hartway must overcome fraud, corruption, deceit and the demons of his past to bring the culprits to justice.

Product details:

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ iUniverse (November 1, 2002)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Page length: 280 pages
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 14.4 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.63 x 9 inches

Fun fact: the term “torch artist” found in this novel appears on page 1000 as one of the examples  in The Routledge Dictionary of Modern American Slang and Unconventional English.

Check out Penal Fires on the All Books page for more information.