How does one approach the murders of gay men in America? David McConnell deftly tackles this tough subject using a number of different cases to try to understand what he terms “American Honor Killings.†The journey involves traveling to places across the country and talking to friends of the deceased as well as, in several cases, the murderers themselves.
The odyssey is as difficult for the author as it is for the reader. What, we wonder, drives them to murder, and why target gay men? Sometimes the standard explanations fail to grasp the true complexity of motivation, ranging from the mad, hyper-religious insanity of Matthew Williams, to the repressed and fearful homosexuality that led Darrell Madden to participate in the murder of a gay man.
McConnell’s investigations lead him on a long and winding path, trying to answer why these men killed gays and taking us to some very unsettling places. No small consideration is the attempt to answer the related question of just what defines masculinity because notions of what it is to be a man drive some of the murders in the work. In some instances, homosexuality (whether acts or the simple desire itself) is seen as an offense to a code of honor, a poisonous idea that led to the murder of Billy Jack Gaither. McConnell finishes with a long discussion of the murder of journalist George Weber and a meditation on the complexity of motives that underlie the murders in the book.
Those who would like to learn more about hate crime murders, as well as those who enjoy “true crime†narratives, will find this book interesting. While much of the information came from interviews, the book would have benefited from a bibliography, or at least a list of works for further reading. This book is recommended for public libraries.
Reviewer: Brady Clemens, Director
Juniata County Library, Mifflintown (PA)
