In My Father's Name - Hardcover

Arax, Mark

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0684808455 ISBN 13: 9780684808451

Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 1996

Synopsis

A "Los Angeles Times" reporter recounts his twenty-two-year search for the truth behind his father's murder, an event that devastated his childhood and eventually revealed startling truths

About this title

Review

When Mark Arax was 15, his father, a Fresno, California, bar owner, was killed by two gunmen in what appeared to be "a hit." Arax became a journalist in order to acquire the skills he needed, and then 20 years later returned to Fresno to ferret out the truth about his father's murder. His book is a detailed and absorbing account of multiple generations of his Armenian family and of his quest to come to terms not only with his father's death and life, but also with his own obsession with the case. As the Los Angeles Times writes, "Almost every American town harbors some brutal secret, but few produce writers like Mark Arax with both the courage and artistic talent needed to coax the story out and shape it into fine literature. Of course, Arax had an extra incentive: the footsteps he followed ran straight through his own family, straight through his own heart."

From Publishers Weekly

In 1972, Arax's father, Ara, was killed by two shooters at his Fresno nightclub, when Mark was 15; the murder was never solved. But the bond between father and son was especially strong, and Mark, who went on to become a journalist with the Los Angeles Times, struggled for years with his compulsion to solve it. Eventually, he moved back to his hometown for that purpose. This unusual, introspective memoir is the result. It reveals that the large Armenian American community in Fresno was made up of survivors of the 1915 Turkish massacre and their descendants, who fought against constant discrimination. Mark's father and his uncle built a chain of five groceries, which failed, and Ara then bought the nightclub, where drugs became an increasing problem. The idealistic and stubborn Ara came to know who the big drug dealers were. Determined to blow the whistle on them, he revealed his plans to some of the very policemen who were protecting them. The murder came soon after. Mark developed a clear idea of who the architects of the slaying were as well as insights into his father, other family members, the "fetid town" and, most important, himself. Although overlong, his book makes for absorbing reading.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0684808455
• ISBN 13: 9780684808451
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400