This is an excerpt from a review on Mar­lin Fitzwater’s book “Esther’s Pil­low”. I inter­viewed Mr. Fitzwa­ter for the review. The review is on Pop​mat​ters​.com website.

When I asked him about the integrity of the press, and how his expe­ri­ences as a press sec­re­tary influ­enced his char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of the news­pa­per reporter in the novel, he replied, “My char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of Tem­ple Dan­dridge [Star reporter] reflects my jour­nal­ism train­ing, and my years as a press sec­re­tary. I gen­er­ally believe in the integrity of jour­nal­ists, even when they round a few cor­ners.” My favorite char­ac­ter in the book is Easy Tucker. Fitzwa­ter agreed.

The assault on Mar­garet Cham­bers, the rip­ping of her cloth­ing, was pun­ish­able. Fitzwa­ter told me that the 2001 equiv­a­lent of tar and feath­ers would be chil­dren falsely accus­ing teach­ers of abuse, par­ents pres­sur­ing teach­ers on cer­tain poli­cies, legal actions against school sys­tems on cur­ricu­lum mat­ters, or any sit­u­a­tion in which cit­i­zens take the law into their own hands. Ques­tioned about dig­ging up fam­ily secrets, Fitzwa­ter believes the “truth is far more inter­est­ing than any sense of shame” He finds it hard to think of Jay as a fam­ily mem­ber, instead, he is just a char­ac­ter in the story. His fam­ily sup­ported the book and the rev­e­la­tions about Jay Fitzwater’s back­ground. Four gen­er­a­tions have passed and now the search is for Jay’s descen­dents. In response to my ques­tions about his long lost rel­a­tives, Fitzwa­ter told me, “No descen­dant of Jay has turned up, although I hope one will.