Lamar Herrin House of the Deaf

House of the Deaf

Lamar Herrin

Unbridled. Nov 2005, $23.95, 272 pp.

ISBN: 1932961119

Two years and eight months ago American Michele Williamson was attending school in Madrid. She was there about a month when, while doing her morning job, the Euzkadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) set off a bomb in the Park of the Buen Retiro killing her and a Guardia. Michele's mother retrieved the corpse while her father remained home in shock. Not long afterward, the mother divorced the father as she went on living.

Now the father Ben is in Madrid seeking answers as the homicide of his oldest daughter has not been solved by Spanish authorities. He needs to know why. As he begins to follow his daughter's final path, he concludes someone must pay for this atrocity. Meanwhile his "spare" daughter Annie, a college student, worries about her father although her mother brushes off her concerns. She is near panic when she realizes he went to Spain and that his stay has been for quite more than just someone saying goodbye. She believes she must go to Madrid before her dad does something stupid leaving her to mourn another loss.

HOUSE OF THE DEAF is a character driven look at the "collateral damage" that a terrorist attack does on loving surviving members. The story line is driven by a frustrated Ben's need to know why and how helpless he feels when everyone tells him to move on. Fans will feel for Ben who is as much a victim as his deceased daughter; his actions also make his grieving living daughter a victim too. Lamar Herrin provides a powerful look at the real impacts of terrorism on the innocent.

Harriet Klausner