Art Imitates Life: Jonathan Lash on Novelistic Storytelling Through Lived Experience

Jonathan Lash, the son of a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and historian, does not regard himself as a writer by profession. Though, he has been writing for over 50 years.

As former Vermont Secretary of Natural Resources and president of the World Resources Institute, Lash established himself as an author with his 1984 book, “A Season of Spoils”, an investigation of environmental destruction and malfeasances under the Reagan administration– a book inspired by Lash’s work as an environmental litigator and advocate. His efforts to hold major corporations accountable for their impact on climate change earned him recognition as one of the “100 Most Influential People In Business Ethics” by Ethisphere Magazine in 2007.

Through his work as a prosecutor, law professor, and environmental litigator, Lash has seen firsthand how the themes of power, inequity, and greed distort American policies and institutions.

In this Q&A, Lash explains the influences that have shaped his novel, “What Death Revealed ”, the story of a young prosecutor whose pursuit of justice at a dark, chaotic time in America’s capital city leads him to an alliance with a police sergeant with wavering belief in true justice.

---

How long have you worked as a writer?

I’ve always loved to write. I think it’s in my DNA. My father was a journalist and then a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian. He pushed me to write from an early age. I have kept a journal off and on since I was twelve. I had a little story about the fog gremlins who kept planes from landing at the tiny Martha’s Vineyard airport published in the Vineyard Gazette when I was thirteen – I think my father was more thrilled than I was.

In 1984, while I was an attorney working for the Natural Resources Defense Council, I wrote a book, A Season of Spoils, about the Reagan Administration’s environmental record. I toured for weeks doing interviews and events trying to influence voters. Apparently, I didn’t have much impact. Reagan won in a historic landslide.

In the ensuing years, I wrote articles for publications ranging from the Harvard Business Review to the Rutland Herald, all non-fiction advocacy.

I did concoct a tale about a little man named Captain Coconut to entertain my kids on the long drive to our cabin in Cape Breton, NS.

So, I guess the honest answer is I have never worked as a writer, but I have been a writer for more than fifty years.

Tell us a bit about your new book, “What Death Revealed.”

It is a murder mystery driven by racism, greed, and hunger for power. It is also a tale of two cities – the gleaming capital of the free world, and the impoverished, largely segregated city of Washington, DC, still in ruins in the aftermath of the riots that shattered the city’s core in reaction to the assassination of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. The riots left scars of racial fury and systemic injustice that lasted for decades.

Amid this background of violence and burnt-out neighborhoods, an idealistic young prosecutor named Jimmy McFarland stumbles on evidence of fraud in the construction of the six-billion-dollar Metro subway system designed to reconnect the city’s fractured communities. Though clearly a matter for the FBI, McFarland embarks on a rogue investigation. He crosses paths with Larry Williams, a black police sergeant whose tough demeanor belies a complicated relationship with justice. Jimmy believes in justice, but Sergeant Williams hasn’t seen much. They form an uneasy alliance and untangle a hidden web of corruption and murder linked to powerful players who thought they were untouchable and confront the question of whether a flawed system of criminal justice can, in fact, produce justice.

What was the impetus for writing this book?

A friend persuaded me to join a writer’s group. One day the leader gave a prompt to write about a dark scene. For some reason, a recollection surfaced of a gray winter morning in Washington when I was a very inexperienced federal prosecutor. I was sitting in a dingy basement office processing cases for cops who’d been on the streets all night. A trio of tired and jaded guys from the vice squad came in visibly annoyed at having to deal with a naïve kid in a blue suit and a power tie. When I read this vignette to the group someone said, “That sounds like the beginning of a crime novel.” For the next few days my imagination was seething with story fragments and images. I just started writing and the characters took over as if they’d been waiting to perform this drama.

You have a background as an attorney, is any of the story based on real-life experiences?

Sure. My answer to the last question describes a scene that was very real. But the book is fiction populated by characters I made up. Of course, it is informed by memory.

What writers have most influenced you?

E. B. White who teaches the power of clarity and simplicity, and Leo Tolstoy whose stories are carried by rich and complex characters. Among mystery writers, I think P. D. James for the elegance of her prose and the believability of her plots, and Anne Cleaves for her ability to create persuasive psychological dramas.

What surprised you, if anything, about writing the book?

How much fun it was. As I said, the characters took over, and I became very involved with them. They taught me to see what was going on. On one occasion when I was stuck on how to deal with a plotline that wasn’t working I let them interview me. They questioned me about why I had let the plot get so twisted and confused. That broke the logjam.

What would you like your readers to take away from reading “What Death Revealed”?

The question of justice is an important one for our society today. I hope that readers are provoked by the relationship between the two protagonists, McFarland and Williams, to consider who gets justice, and how we can expand its reach.

What are you currently working on?

I’ve started on the sequel to “What Death Revealed,” and I’m working on a ghost story.