Recompense

A Novel by Joyce Morgan Hammock

Published by Writers Showcase
A division of iUniverse
5220 South 16th Street, Suite 200
Lincoln, NE 68512
ISBN # 0-595-22175-0
352 pgs $18.95

 

Recompense: from the Latin word ‘recompensare’ meaning to return in kind. Or, if we want to use a modern term-payback. Moreover, we all know what the infamous ‘they’ say about what payback is, right? This is a story about deserved payback against one of most vile man I have read about in a while.

Eddie had it rough growing up. At the age of six, he was taken from his drug abusing negligent mother. Once placed into foster care, eventually he came to live at the home of Elliot Bowers, a well-respected member of the Baltimore Police Department, working as a narcotics detective; his wife Marian, and their daughter Caroline.

Time passes and eventually he is accepted as one of the family. Until, now seventeen, Eddie decides to skip school one day. He heads back to the house, thinking it deserted since everyone was at either work or school. But what he finds completely devastates him when he walks in on Caroline being raped by her father. He threatens the older man, but all that does is just make him angry. He asks Eddie just who he thinks would believe the word of some foster kid that had some trouble with the law against an upstanding member of the Police Department. Eddie, seeing he would really have no chance, says he will not mention anything as long as it never happens again, and Bowers agrees.

Eddie thought that would be it, until three days later and he is greeted by police cruisers when he gets home. The officers are there to arrest him for the rape of Caroline, and Detective Bowers is the one that filed the charges. Now arrested for a crime he didn’t commit, Eddie needs all the help he can get from even the most unexpected places. Detective Bowers, on the other hand, begins to lose his grip on reality, causing him to spin further and further into a realm of violence and hatred that is far beyond his control.

Part of what makes this story riveting is the things author Joyce Hammock writes about could happen to anyone. In this country, it seems the days of innocent until proven guilty have fallen by the wayside, especially with the circus that the media has devolved into, and the all to often arrest of someone that has sworn to uphold the public trust being found guilty of corruption on some level. I think the phrase should be changed to read, ‘innocent until proven guilty unless you have enough money or influence, and then it doesn’t matter’. That would be, unfortunately, much more realistic.

Ms. Hammock has created a story that is compelling and terrifying at the same time. This is a hard book to stop reading. The characters and storyline drag you along page after page as you feel with Eddie, and what he is going through, and watch Detective Bowers descend deeper and deeper into the abyss of lies, hatred, and rage. This real page-turner will keep you guessing as to the outcome until the very end. She shows the system at work, both the good and bad, and not pulling any punches in the process. Bravo to you Ms. Hammock on a story well told, but I don’t think I could read another like it anytime soon; emotionally this one wore me out.