Amazon.com Review
"The man of knowledge," Nietzsche is said to have remarked, "must not only be able to love his enemies; he must also be able to hate his friends." Indeed, it's a thirst for existential knowledge and adventure that unexpectedly pushes two bosom friends beyond the brink of disaster--and ultimately calls into question the very meaning of friendship--in Journal of the Dead. Jacob Kersten's riveting account—expanding on an article originally published in Maxim--reconstructs the true-crime story of a baffling murder that took place one desperate morning in 1999 in New Mexico's Rattlesnake Canyon. Raffi Kodikian and David Coughlin, having lost their way after embarking on a casual, short-term hike in the desert, find themselves out of hope, on the verge of fatal dehydration. According to a journal kept by Kodikian, they decide on a mutual suicide pact to spare each other excruciating pain before an inevitable death. Yet Kodikian survives after stabbing his friend. Soon afterward, he is rescued by rangers and subsequently charged with the murder of his best friend.
Kersten's source material has a disturbingly fascinating quality from the start, but his accomplishment in shaping it into a multi-layered narrative is admirable and artful. Kersten pulls out all the stops in depicting not just the back story of these two friends and their circle but also the deeper focus of the history of the desert, its allure and attendant attractions--in particular the Carlsbad Caverns--along with intriguing excursions on such topics as the biology of dehydration, the mechanics of topographical maps, and the legal niceties of the "intoxication defense." His choice of background details enhances our sense of the extreme situation in which these unfortunate individuals are trapped and helps retard our easy judgment of Kodikian’s choice. Kersten is especially good at restoring an element of suspense--the outcome of the desert tragedy is replayed earlier in his book--in the way he allows the ensuing courtroom drama to unfold. Yet however much he attempts to maintain an aura of ambiguity around Kodikian's motives, Kersten can't quite efface a stance of exculpatory compassion.
--Thomas May
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
An expanded version of Kersten's article in Maxim magazine, where he was a senior editor, this is a well-told account of a fatal 1999 cross-country trip by two best friends, Raffi Kodikian and David Coughlin, that ended in the desert near New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns with Coughlin stabbed to death and Kodikian claiming that he had, in effect, committed a mercy killing. Kersten demonstrates, in his first book, good journalism and a flair for the true crime genre. He carefully details the beginnings of the young men's friendship and the pull of the open road that led the Kerouac-loving Kodikian and the rugged, adventurous Coughlin to attempt what should have been an easy journey. Kersten expertly describes the rigors of Rattlesnake Canyon in the Chihuahuan Desert, in which the two men got lost: "not only the largest, but probably the least understood desert in North America." He also unsparingly details the horrible effects dehydration has on the human body, which he uses to illuminate aspects of Kodikian's murder trial and Kodikian's claim that Coughlin had demanded to be put out of his misery. Although Kodikian ultimately pleaded no contest to second-degree murder, Kersten's skillful use of court transcripts and interviews with key law enforcement officials and lawyers shows that there were more questions than answers about what happened, and that the true heart of the matter is the "ambiguity" between what could have been "an understandable act committed out of compassion under incredible physical and mental duress" or "an ingenious lie, designed to hide the truth of an enraged murder."
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
