The Executioner's Song
by Norman Mailer
Our Price: $39.99
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.42 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Norman MailerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1998-04-28
ISBN: 0375700811
Number of pages: 1072
Publisher: Vintage
Book Reviews of The Executioner's Song
Book Review: "If I feel like murder, it does not necessarily matter who gets murdered."
Summary: 5 Stars
Winner of the 1980 Pulitzer Prize, The Executioner's Song scrutinizes the life and death of Gary Gilmore, arrested and tried for the 1976 killings of two innocent men in Provo, Utah, during petty burglaries which netted him less than $250. Author Norman Mailer bases his novel on the one hundred interviews and hundreds of phone conversations he conducted with people involved in Gilmore's life, trial, and execution. He also examined all available police documents and court transcripts, and made many trips to Utah and Oregon to talk with witnesses and people who knew Gilmore,
Having had no contact with Gary Gilmore himself, Mailer maintains a reporter's distance, ultimately portraying Gilmore as a loser who got his "education" in the prison system in which he spent half his life, and turning him into a symbol of the sociopath for whom society has found no answer except the death penalty. The novel divides naturally into several sections: the gruesome crimes themselves, including Gilmore's mindset at the time, his background, and the effect of the crimes on his family and friends; the pre-trial maneuvering and the trial itself; the conviction and post-conviction appeals; and Gilmore's execution and its aftermath.
Gilmore is not presented sympathetically, though Mailer goes to great lengths to portray him accurately. Gilmore's unusually high IQ, his poetic letters to his girlfriend Nicole, and his admission of guilt and desire to pay for his crimes with his own death create a unique picture of someone who had both intelligence and a kind of honor. But neither Gilmore nor the psychologists could ever explain why he did what he did. One moment Gilmore says, "I don't know what the hell I'm doing," and another moment he says, "I've always had a choice."
Mailer takes the long view throughout the novel, which ultimately becomes an extraordinary study of a man facing justice and the extraordinary steps the judicial system takes to see that true justice is served--the agonies endured by friends, the sleepless nights of attorneys and judges, the soul-searching of those required to carry out the sentence, many of them Mormons who do not support the death penalty, and the frustration of Gilmore, who wants death and fears that he will be reprieved. A brilliant and complete study of the American way of life and those, like Gilmore, who cannot live within it, the novel is, however, excruciatingly long. The last half of the book, with the minutiae of the legal maneuvering, the post-trial activities, and the appeals could have been cut in half without sacrificing depth or truth. n Mary Whipple
West Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in West Books
Nomads of a Desert City: Personal Stories from Citizens of the Streetby Barbara Seyda
University of Arizona Press; Published: 2001-08-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $35.00
Davy Crockettby Constance Rourke
University of Nebraska Press; Published: 1998-06-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $88.90
Sketches from the Ranch: A Montana Memoirby Dan Aadland
Bison Books; Published: 2008-11-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $12.33
Price in other shops:
When Montana and I Were Young: A Frontier Childhood (Women in the West)by Margaret Bell
University of Nebraska Press; Published: 2002-03-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $30.00
Hollywoodlandby David Wallace
Thorndike Press; Published: 2003-04-02; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $18.50
Price in other shops:
Into the Wildby Jon Krakauer
G. K. Hall & Company; Published: 1997-12; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $373.26
I Feel Earthquakes More Often Than They Happen: Coming to California in the Age of Schwarzeneggerby Amy Wilentz
Simon & Schuster; Published: 2007-08-14; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.01
Price in other shops:
It Seems Like Only Yesterday: Mining and Mapping in Arizona's First Century Vol 1: The Yuma Yearsby Robert Lenon
iUniverse, Inc.; Published: 2004-06-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $16.88
Price in other shops:
The Gold and the Blue: A Personal Memoir of the University of California, 1949 - 1967: Volume 1, Academic Triumphsby Clark Kerr
University of California Press; Published: 2001-10-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $16.40
Price in other shops:
The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers Movementby Susan Ferriss, Ricardo Sandoval
Mariner Books; Published: 1998-04-15; Paperback; Book
Best price: $14.94
Price in other shops:
Similar books summaries and other product reviews
American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City Bombingby Lou Michel, Dan Herbeck
Harper; Published: 2001-05-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $12.97
Price in other shops:
Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead: The Frank Meeink Story as Told to Jody M. Roy, Ph.D.by Frank Meeink, Jody M. Roy
Hawthorne Books; Published: 2010-03-16; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.00
Price in other shops:
Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Memberby Sanyika Shakur
Grove Press; Published: 2004-06-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.72
Price in other shops:
The Armies of the Night: History as a Novel, the Novel as Historyby Norman Mailer
Plume; Published: 1995-01-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
Doctor Dealer: The Rise and Fall of an All-American Boy and His Multimillion-Dollar Cocaine Empireby Mark Bowden
Grove Press; Published: 2000-11-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.47
Price in other shops:
Gaspipe: Confessions of a Mafia Bossby Philip Carlo
William Morrow; Published: 2008-07-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $18.85
Price in other shops:
In Cold Bloodby Truman Capote
Vintage; Published: 1994-02-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.49
Price in other shops:
Panzram A Journal of MurderAmok Books; Published: 2002-08-31; Paperback; Book
Best price: $16.43
Price in other shops:
The Naked and the Dead: 50th Anniversary Editionby Norman Mailer
Picador; Published: 2000-08-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.74
Price in other shops:
Shot in the Heartby Mikal Gilmore
Anchor; Published: 1995-08-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.00
Price in other shops: