My Library System Has the New Richard Wright Book

My library system has the new Richard Wright book—tbat’s right, the same Wright who wrote the classics you’d read in high school and died in 1960—A Father’s Law. It was an uncompleted novel Wright started near his death but was recently completed by his daughter Julia.

This novel of generational conflict focuses on the relationship between a black policeman and his son. Ruddy Turner, the father, has been recently promoted to police chief in a Chicago suburb and gets involved in the investigation of a series of murders. Due to several consequences, Ruddy becomes uneasy with the notion that his son may be directly involved with the deaths.

A recent letter to the editor in the New York Times Book Review noted that Wright’s new book could be traced to the influence of writer Cornell Woolrich. Woolrich was a popular pulp writer during the 1930s and 1940s and Wright was a fan of those mystery magazines. In fact, one of Woolrich’s stories “Charlie Won’t Be Home Tonight” mirrors Wright’s novel although with white characters.

And Woolrich does have a writing legacy continuing today as a recognized classic crime writer and source for film noirs including Alfred Hitchcock’s famous Rear Window.