Monday, September 15, 2008

A sordid, twisted tale

An Unfinished Canvas: A True Story of Love, Family, and Murder in Nashville, by Michael Glasgow and Phyliss Gobbell

Nashville lawyer Michael Glasgow and true crime author Phyliss Gobbell do an admirable job recounting the events surrounding the 1996 disappearance of Nashville artist Janet March and the nearly ten-year chain of events which culminated in the 2005 conviction of her husband, Perry, for her murder. A sordid, twisted tale indeed.

Three things I didn't like about An Unfinished Canvas:

First, how many times must a reader be told that Lake Chapala - where Perry March fled with his children not long after being named the primary suspect in his wife's disappearance - is "Mexico's largest natural lake" before it finally sets in. A half-dozen, according to the authors.

Nashville's Gerst Haus German restaurant supposedly has "food [that] is expensive for something less than fine German fare." Since when are $8-13 entrees "expensive?" I've eaten at the Gerst Haus dozens and dozens of times, with dozens and dozens of friends and colleagues, and I've never heard anyone say "Gerst Haus" and "expensive" in the same breath.

Finally, the authors claim that the L'affaire Perry March is "the most celebrated case in Nashville history." Not true. In 1908, Nashville Tennessean editor Edward Carmack, who was also a former U.S. Senator and Democratic gubernatorial candidate, was gunned down on a Nashville street by a political opponent, Robin Cooper. The "Carmack-Cooper" saga gripped the city for weeks; and after a well-publicized trial, Robin Cooper was acquitted, after which Carmack's supporters in the state legislature voted to erect a statue honoring him on the capitol grounds (which you can still see on the south side of the capitol to this day).