Review of
Instaread Summary of While the City Slept, by Eli Sanders
Three out of five stars
In my opinion, the author of this summary missed what
is the key issue in the story of Isaiah Kalebu and his victims Teresa Butz and
Jennifer Hopper. That issue is the massive reduction in spending for mental
health and the associated failures of the legal and medical system to deal with
people that are progressively descending into madness. It is mentioned, but not
given the serious coverage that it deserves.
Kalebu is a man that exhibited many of the symptoms of
mental illness for some time, he was examined several times by mental health
professionals with appearances before a judge for erratic behavior and minor
crimes. Eventually, he repeatedly raped Teresa and Jennifer at knifepoint,
severely injuring Jennifer and killing Teresa.
A great deal of
the background of the female victims is explained, including their childhoods,
their skill sets and the fact that they were lesbians. Kalebu was the product
of a tough environment, yet that is not the reason for his mental illness,
several of his ancestors also suffered from the affliction.
While the three
main characters are people with lives, the end result of the major crime was a
consequence of society spending far too little on mental health treatment. This
shifts the burden to other ways in which society pays for it, in this case it
led to at least one death, a trial, conviction and long-term incarceration.
That should have been the focus of this summary, yet it is rendered secondary
to the sexual orientations of the two female victims.
This book was made available for free for review
purposes.
No comments:
Post a Comment