Customer Reviews

The Dreams of Ada

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I have read many true crime books in my life.
Out of these books I would estimate 10% qualify as truly excellent or great true crime books.
This is one of those books.

A Book Review should not be debating the guilt or innocence of the suspects mentioned in the book.

What the average reader wants to know is will this book keep me up all night turning the pages?

The best true crime books are better than their fiction counterparts because the things people do to each other are more unbelieveable than anything a fiction writer could invent.

This book qualifies as a book that will keep you up all night and the next day when you try to read it while eating lunch.

My sympathies are certainly with the relatives of the victim but nevertheless this is one of the best True Crime books I've ever read.

By the way, my secret to finding the best true crime books is to look at the bottom of the outside cover of the book. If the book was a Book of the Month Selection or an Edgar Award Winner or Nominee...buy the book. (This book was an Edgar Award Nominee) You won't be sorry.

Here are 5 others that will keep you up all night:
1) Minds of Billy Mulligan
2) Zodiac
3) Unveiling Claudia
4) Zebra
5) Careless Whispers

Mayer's missive about miscarriage of justice in Ada, OKlahoma, has been re-released to coincide with best-selling legal thriller author (and attorney) John Grisham's first foray into non-fiction True Crime, *The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town.* Although chronicling different crimes and different cases, they occur on common ground. Both constitute a grippingly nauseating expose of Ada, America, run totally amuck. (Be afraid. Be very afraid that this can and IS happening right here, in the "Land of the Free") In the Afterward to this update, (no pictures :-( Mayer aptly describes the obscenity of District Attorney Bill Peterson (WHAT?!? He's still there, in his absolute power?!? Proving what they say about absolute power - it corrupts absolutely) and his band of Good Old Boys as "Kafka in Oklahoma."
Coerced, by interrogators who would make the SS & KGB proud, into dreaming up implausibly impossible "dreams" of what could have happened to a missing convenience store clerk, 2 then-young men have been matriculating in the Oklahoma prison system for over 20 years now.
This reviewer, graduate of the University of Oklahoma's College of Law, is simply dumbstruck. I have dreams of Peterson storm-trooping through his Pontotoc County Courthouse to the swirling strains of "Darth Vader's Theme." As another son of the South would ask:
People of Pontotoc County, What Are You Thinking?
And shame on the rest of you all, Oklahoma, for allowing this boil on the buckle of the Bible Belt to not merely fester, but prosper.
Both books should be required reading for those who profess to believe in Liberty and Justice for All.
[and see wardandfontenot.com]
/TundraVision, Amazon Reviewer

true, this whole story reeks of miscarriage of justice, but my review is more focused on the writing style of the author, robert mayer. he is good. really good. he obviously must have had access to most of the participants and just seems to be like a fly on the wall; observing, watching, listening and just taking us through the twists and turns. it is obvious even he does not know where the story is going; what is going to happen next. we experience it as he does. it is almost like a work of fiction. i wish mayer would write more true crime. this is what i look for when i scour the book stores for true crime books.

I read this book well over a decade ago when Tommy told me about it in a letter. I knew both of these men fairly well and spent a great deal of time with them in the year before this crime occurred, particularly Tommy. Karl was a little "different" (mentally slow) but he was always kind to me and Tommy somewhat protected him because of what Karl had been through with his mother's death. They had many opportunities to hurt me as they spent a great deal of time in my apartment and I had been over to Tommy's mothers' home a couple of times and his brother's home on several occasions - I moved away from Ada just a few weeks before Donna (who I did not know) was killed. I also knew (or knew of) most of the other individuals in the book...and if I had to choose who would be most likely to commit a murder, Tommy would have been the last one I would have ever chosen. When I knew Tommy he was one of the gentlest souls I'd ever known - I can still see him talking and playing with his pet bird and how obvious it was that he valued life, even that of a a small creature. I don't believe he did it and I will never believe it. This book will keep your attention...and it will capture your heart as well.

Never before have I experienced that "can't put it down" scenario with a book! This definately tops my list. The only query I have is that it is an older book/story (events-'84, book release-'87) and I was left uncertain of the fates of Tommy and Karl. Now I don't know where to turn for answers!

I feel that the author of this book did a good job of not trying to prove the boys innocent - just to present the facts. I was visiting my grandparents in Ada when this occurred. The victim and I were the same age. I was never sure that the boys actually committed the crime and felt at the time they were just toying with the police. When they found her body, the earring they found convinced me the boys were innocent. As much as the family needs closure I think it would be better served for the guilty party to be behind bars and not passing the family in the grocery store or on the street, laughing at them because of his dirty little secret.

Thank Heavens I found this again. I have had 4 copies, loaned them out, never to be returned. I had almost given up. Being from Ada and knowing a lot of the people involved really gave me a connection to this book. The author gave his all in descriptions of Ada and the people involved in this grusome story. Even if I wasn't from Ada or knew any of the people, I would still have enjoyed it just as much. Believe me, this copy will not leave my house!

Robert Mayer's The Dreams of Ada is almost in a class by itself. This is a stone-whodunnit, but sensitively written by Mayer. The reader will be left painfully uncertain about just what happened in the little town of Ada, and whether the right men are actually in jail. A must for true-crime buffs looking for a high-quality read. Recommended even for those who don't like true crime but would enjoy a mystery or a tale of the workings of a small town.

"Spring became summer in Ada. The fields in the outlying areas were green. Lilacs and hollyhocks and roses took turns blossoming on the small lawns that front most of Ada's houses. They bloomed on the large ranches surrounding the towns, and near the small working-class houses and in colored town, which is what the small black section is still called.
Stories about the case in the Ada News stopped in mid-May; but members of the Haraway family called the police frequently- every day in the early weeks- to see if there was any news."

Dreams of Ada is a true crime story which will have you turning the pages all night and you will find it very hard to put down. The author Robert Mayer has given us a detailed account of this crime and also about the interrogations and the trials.
The disappearance of Denice Haraway a young married woman working at a convenience store while attending college, sent the entire community of Ada and beyond into a tailspin. No one could find out how Denice just disappeared off her job one night at the convenience store, never to be heard of again. Was she raped and robbed, or was she murdered for any particular reason? And if not that, was she seeing someone else and just wanted out of her marriage to Steve Haraway, deciding to walk off into the twilight with another man and a new life? Whatever the conclusion, the police was not getting anywhere fast, and being pressured, they made their arrests. Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot were to be the arrested. I will not venture to go into any detail about the inquiries, the testimonies, the trial or the verdict. This is a book that has much food for thought and it stays on your mind, even after you have read these 512 pages. Thank you Mr. Robert Mayer, for a well-written work of non-fiction. It certainly broke my heart.
Reviewed by Heather Marshall Negahdar (SUGAR-CANE 28/01/07

ABSOLUTELY RIVETING TRUE CRIME ACCOUNT OF TWO YOUTHS CONVICTED AND SENT TO DEATH ROW FOR DUBIOUS CONFESSIONS TO THE MURDER OF A CONVENIENCE STORE CLERK..........THE EVENTS HERE TOOK PLACE ALMOST TWENTY YEARS AGO AND THE 1987 BOOK IS BADLY IN NEED OF AN UPDATE/AFTERWORD........OTHER THAN THAT,THE BOOK IS FASCINATING AND ALWAYS LEADS TO MORE QUESTIONS THAN THERE CAN BE ANSWERS TO......