Anytime I see a book with the word “correspondents” in the title, well, I stop and pick it up, and in the case of Tim Murphy’s “The Correspondents,” I’m glad I did. I was actually searching for another of Murphy’s books, “The Stolen Coast,” but some heartless bastard had already checked it out. I’m inquiring with local police as to who has the book. There will be swift but just punishment. Also of note, the author quote on the cover is by Elliot Ackerman, another author I’ve read extensively. Always a good sign. By the way, “The Stolen Coast” is actually by Dwyer Murphy, which means because I’m an idiot. I stumbled on the wrong author but found a great book in the process. (When you are cool the sun shines on your twenty four hours a day.)
Lebanon, family, politics, war, travel, the history of the Boston area, and a spiderweb of entangled lives. This book jumps from New England to Damascus, Beirut to DC and back again. Journalism and the sadistic nature of the business. Gun violence and radicalization. The failed effort that was the second Gulf War. I gave this book to my eighty seven year old uncle and thirty pages in he said “Danny, I really like this.”
Novels have a way of presenting information that allows one to drop the guard. If I even mention any of these topics to my hard right friends they will immediately bring up the Hunter Biden laptop, but presented in a novel there seems to be a bit of leeway in regard to pondering something. (I thought I had problems with MY laptop.) Maybe the novel is the kit gloves our fragile, radicalized public needs? Murphy clearly did his homework as the book details so many different historical realities. I learned things and I was all in on the characters. This book made my upcoming trip to Lebanon even more alluring. Get it, read it.
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LOL. When I read your first couple of lines, I was going to going to say “Dan-O, it’s Dywer, not Tim, who wrote The Stolen Coast.” Then you course-corrected. Now I’ll add Tim’s to my TBR list. As an aside, I just came back from a Massacheusets road trip. Since I was in the area of the setting for The Stolen Coast, I took a morning drive around the locations to let the book seep into my memory and shoot some photos. I’ll be doing a blog post myself on this ramble!