‘Conviction’ has believable characters, intriguing twists
Brooklyn BookBeat
Julia Dahl’s examination of the myriad communities that exist — sometimes not so harmoniously — in Brooklyn fuels her third excellent novel featuring freelance reporter Rebekah Roberts.
In “Conviction,” Dahl effectively uses the backdrop of the Crown Heights riots that pitted the Hasidic and black communities against each other during 1991 that had ramifications for decades. Racism and anti-Semitism are smoothly woven into the plot as Dahl shows how a violent nature can be formed and that ethical journalism matters and can change lives.
Rebekah agrees to look into the case of DeShawn Perkins, who has been in prison for 16 years in the death of his foster parents and foster sister in 1992. DeShawn claims he’s innocent, but Rebekah knows that almost every convicted murderer says that. Before the murders, DeShawn had been rebelling against his very loving foster parents — a situation well-known in the community and at the tight-knit church the family attended. The pastor and several of his parishioners were quick to blame DeShawn, who says he was coerced into confessing and that a policeman took a crack addict’s identification without questioning it.