Brain Storm by Richard Dooling

Random House, 401 pages, $25

Reviewed by Stephen M. Murphy in 1998

         Richard Dooling thinks hate crime laws are a bad idea. Not that he favors hate crimes, he just views the law's efforts to punish people for their thoughts as preposterous. In his third novel, Brain Storm, Dooling takes this theme and runs with it in directions that seem at once outrageously funny, yet disturbingly true.  A nominee for the National Book Award for his 1994 novel, White Man's Grave, Dooling again displays his exceptional skills as a fiction writer by crafting an entertaining novel while making a serious and thought-provoking point.

         The alleged perpetrator of a hate crime in Brain Storm is James F. Whitlow, a working-class hothead charged with murder. His victim is Elvin Brawley, a black deaf printer and local artist, who had been hired by Whitlow's wife to tutor their deaf son in sign language.

         There is no doubt that Whitlow killed Brawley; the only question is why. Whitlow claims he caught Brawley in bed with Whitlow's wife. Other evidence indicates that after killing Brawley, Whitlow made derogatory comments about Brawley's race and disability. So did Whitlow kill Brawley because he was black?  Because he was disabled?  Or because he was sleeping with his wife?

         The United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri (St. Louis) smells a case with a lot of political mileage and charges Whitlow with a hate crime. The statute in question requires that Whitlow's sentence be enhanced if he intentionally selected his victim because of race or disability. Whitlow's court-appointed lawyer, Joe Watson, is a young associate at a large corporate law firm, whose primary experience has been in the realm of intellectual property violations involving graphic, violent computer games. He was appointed because of a law review article he authored in law school.

         The firm is horrified that one of its associates will be defending an accused murderer and asks District Court Judge Whittaker Stang to rescind the appointment on the ground of Watson's inexperience. Judge Stang summarily denies the request and embarrasses Watson's boss in the process, reminding him of a terrible courtroom defeat he suffered years before.

         Dooling portrays Judge Stang as a power-hungry jurist intent on abusing his lifetime appointment by humiliating every lawyer who appears before him. The extremes to which Judge Stang abuses his power will bring chuckles to any lawyer who has felt the sting of a federal judge's wrath. Referring to two three-foot stacks of motion papers, Judge Stang tells a full courtroom of lawyers,

I can admit to you and to your clients that I do not read any of these papers. Do you know why I can admit it?  Not reading them is not a felony. Admitting that I do not read them is not a high crime or misdemeanor.

         Concerned only with avoiding impeachment, Judge Stang seemingly knows no other limits. His method of ruling on motions to continue trial hopefully will not be adopted by other judges:

         Brain Storm's other characters are no less colorful. Watson hires beautiful Dr. Rachel Palmquist as the defense expert witness to rebut the charge that Whitlow was motivated by hate. Dr. Palmquist studies how certain motives affect or are controlled by specific areas of the brain. She describes her work to Watson as follows:"A good brain scientist might ask about the timing, the sequence, the neural hardware required to transmit these two emotions or motives - rage and bigotry.... What if rage caused by marital infidelity is not the same thing as hate inspired by bigotry?"

         After his boss's embarrassment in court, Watson finds himself unemployed with one poor client but without the financial support of his firm. He decides to associate Myrna Schweich, a Heineken-guzzling, pot-smoking, foul-mouthed, radical lesbian defense attorney. When this unlikely pair locks horns with the prosecutor, the insults fly in all directions, leaving the reader laughing in tears.

         Dooling's writing style is fast-paced and energetic, but never boring. By gradually piling on clues, he keeps the reader guessing until the end why Whitlow killed Brawley. Even then, he makes us wonder if we can ever know why someone acted in a certain way. As Watson tells Judge Stang in response to a question on whether he ever wonders about his own motives:"Sometimes I do things, and I don't understand why. Often I have mixed motives, but I can't sort them out, and then at other times I think I have certain motives, but I actually have other motives."

         Few books provide as complete a package as Brain Storm:  wit, wisdom, a compelling mystery, colorful characters, and a powerful and thought-provoking theme. It is a book that stays with you even after you've closed the cover, forcing you to think of hate crime laws in new and perhaps unpopular ways. In short, few readers will remain unchanged after finishing Brain Storm. And what more can you ask from a work of fiction?