Not For The Squeamish, Or Faint Of Heart, Girls!!!!!!!!!!

                                        It was my beloved Monsieur, who reminded me of this.  Back in early Summer of 2011, when we were in New Orleans, we did a number of walking tours of the city, many geared to a particular theme.  We did, one evening, a Ghost Tour, which was so fascinating, I would take it again, if we went back. On that tour, Monsieur remembers our guide pointing down a side street--it must have been North Rampart, and talking about a young man and girl who got into a relationship, with disastrous, murderous, consequences.  This did not register at all with me, until I was reminded he pointed to a market on the corner that was said to have been a bar where the couple worked.  A picture of that building popped into my head, so I know Monsieur was telling the truth.  But I don't recall if the details of the murder were mentioned, or the names of the victims/perpetrator.

                                         Then, as reported, several weeks back, I saw the story of Addie Hall and Zack Bowen, dramatized on one of those Investigation Discovery programs. When I Googled them, I discovered the book, pictured above, and knew I just had to read it!  Well, I did, and let me tell you it gives you the full horror of both parties.

                                          While I view this as an essentially tragic story, and I still have a lot of sympathy in my heart for both Addie and Zack, the book makes it clear neither was always the greatest to be around.  Both had a propensity to violence; Addie due to an unstable past that included sexual abuse and a series of abusive relationships, a bi-polar personality that was not always controlled by meds, and a tendency to get downright dangerous, when she drank!  I am sure there are those who, when the tragedy was first reported, thought it would have happened the other way--with Addie doing in Zack. After reading this book, I can easily see why.

                                              The book gives us a surface picture of Addie, but not a complete one; we never really learn about her family or the surroundings she was born into, and may have escaped from. Perhaps the family did not want to cooperate with author Ethan Brown, keeping things private and to themselves. Which is easy to understand, too.

                                                Zach's family life gets much coverage, as does his military service, and the PTSD he and his regiment suffered when emerging from it.  The book makes a case that vets do not get enough benefits and help when transitioning back to civilian life, especially  when it comes to mental health. And I am not about to argue with that.  But the question that the book just cannot answer is this--many suffer from PTSD, with its outbreaks of murder, martial discord, depression, drug abuse, and even suicide.  It does not explain how Zack goes from strangling Addie--understandable enough, on a surface level; Addie had gone behind his back and signed the apartment lease in her name, giving her the right to throw him out, and he reacted to that with rage.  OK.  But how do you go from that, to necrophilia, to dismembering and cooking someone you at one time cared about?  The book does not begin to hint at a theory, leaving one with the uneasy notion that there may not be any.  And that, with their personalities, Zack and Addie would have not only combusted each other, but anyone else they might otherwise have gotten involved with.  But pinning all this on the military????  I am no right winger, honeys; you all know that, but I just don't think you can.

                                               What the book also makes clear is that, especially in the post Katrina period, New Orleans was a wild and rough place, with the homicide rate accelerating to where it was at one point the biggest in the country.  Which is shocking to this New York based queen, who has heard of that city's rep since infancy--and ended up there, anyway!

                                                   After reading this book, I am not so sure I would readily go back to NOLA, which is fraught with more dangers than I realized, not to mention a corrupt and ineffectual police force. Only time will tell if I return there, though I hear Savannah and Charleston have similar period charms.
If the heat, and the threat of another Katrina don't put you off, the crime reporting in here will!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                     Anyone with any kind of interest in this exotic city cannot afford not to read this book!  It is as ghoulish and Gothic as anything the fiction writers could come up with, and, grotesque though it be, it will remain an irrevocable part of that city's history!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                       And maybe allow Addie and Zack to rest in peace!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!