Customer Reviews

In My Father's Name

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm originally from Fresno, California and at the time of this murder, my grandfather, Ted C. Wills Sr., was Mayor of the city. When I picked up this book, I didn't know what to expect. What I found was validation.

For years I struggled with the bits and pieces of recollection I had regarding this period of my youth. Arax's book not only validated my experiences, what I had witnessed, but connected many of the dots regarding other incidences related to my past. The cover ups, illegal activity and silent handshakes were a part of my youth and Arax described this perfectly.

The author's well placed words painted one vivid picture after another about a mystery which is reality based. At the end of the book, the pictures come together as one complete "town" portrait. In doing this, he brilliantly exposed the "dark side" of not only my history, but of a town bent on keeping up appearances, at all costs. Secrets were taken out of the closet and placed squarely on to the laps of the public at large. "If we do not expose our secrets, we are bound to repeat them."

I strongly suggest this book to anyone interested in seeing how organized crime on a local level works. Along with this, I hope that readers will appreciate how the author was able to weave powerful Armenian history with not only his own family of origin, but with the political and criminal drama of a small town.

When I first started this book, I was amazed at the description that Arax gives of Fresno. Being a life-long resident of Fresno, I can imagine everything he describes. Then I read about the corruption that I'd heard about all my life, and see the proof of it all. I was shocked beyond belief.

Then I read about these supposedly upstanding citizens that I've heard about all my life (who has community centers and arena's named after them here in Fresno) and I feel like a veil has been pulled from my eyes.

Mark Arax tells a story of life in a lot of small, and large, cities. The one part of the story I wish would have been included (but it is safer for him NOT to include, being that he is still a resident of Fresno) is not only the corruption of the past, but the corruption of the present as well. He describes how the city of Fresno was built upon corruption, ran in corruption for many years, and hinted to the present day corruption, but had to stop. Hopefully he will write another book about Fresno, and reveal something to everyone.

If you like to read, and you like to be trapped by a book, then I suggest you purchase this book.

Mark Arax has written a superb novel chronicling his zealous search for the
identity of the men who gunned down his father in his own bar in Fresno
back in 1972 when Mark was 15. The gripping story takes us from Fresno to LA
to NY to Mexico and Anatolia, the Ottoman empire, 1915, San Francisco, and
back to Fresno to circle around the little city of corruption and crime,
related to the pernicious drug trade. Armenia, a nation of people erased
from its ancestral homeland, submitted to genocide by the Turks
and dispersed in this American century, to America which promised freedom
and opportunity, delivered new strife, leading to new crises.

This epic saga tells of three generations of Arax family members overcoming
impossible odds to finally make a decent home for themselves in Fresno only
to have it shattered by a cold blooded murder on a Sunday evening in a
shady bar just before Mark's dad was to have made a public announcement,
naming names, letting the public know what went on in city hall and at
police headquarters. He was executed Mafia style with a son left in its
wake holding on to a bag of questions and a burning desire to get some
answers.

And yet, this state is endemic to the Armenian existence in its diaspora.
The resonances between Mark Arax's saga and that of every post-genocide
Armenian are loud and clear. Why were over a million of their forefathers
so brutally and systematically slaughtered like cattle at the turn of this
century? Why was the life of every Armenian in the Ottoman empire so cheap
and worthless? What had Armenians done to deserve the racist wrath of
Turks, Kurds and other nomadic bands of brigands in the Anatolian plains,
the ancestral homeland of all Armenians? Why do Turks today not admit what
is so plainly true? Why the denial and historical revisionism? How are
dignity and justice to be restored when nations place economic or strategic
considerations before the demands of historical truths? How can
democracies and free nations join in the Turkish lie that nothing happened
in 1915, it was just war, things like that happen all the time, let bygones
be bygones...?

Mark Arax would not stop asking his haunting questions either. His father
was murdered. The police never even tried to solve the case. Mark would
do his damnedest to get to the bottom of it himself, and he would do it at
any cost. Mark Arax was rewarded for his quixotic aspirations by much more
than he could have imagined. While the minutest details of his father's
murder are still unresolved, what Mark discovered was more precious and
more lasting than the particulars of a case of a Fresno drug mob and city
hall -- about to be exposed -- hit. Mark Arax found the true identity of
his people, the Armenians in the Californian diaspora, and their struggle
to preserve their traditions and rich heritage. Through all this, Mark
fathered himself to become a gifted professional journalist, a responsible
father and husband and a conscientious citizen. The long and persistent
journey that he took makes for a great read. The story is compelling and
gripping, yet it is filled with true human drama spanning three
generations. His is not a murder mystery with bought off politicians all
the way to Sacramento, with its rich source of drugs supplied from Mexico.
No, that is only part of the story. His is not the chronicling of how the
Hell's Angels distributed marijuana to all points north and south in the
60s and 70s, with the marijuana being air-dropped into the vineyards of
Fresno. No, that is only part of the story. His is not the story of a
"crazy" grandfather who was a businessman who held fond attachment to
communist ideology, who had big dreams and bombastic demeanor and yet
failed as many times as not in all his business ventures. His uncles,
great uncles and his own struggle with American or Armenian identity all
mix in to produce a unique story of love and redemption. A boy who has to
be the rudder in a cracked up society, a disintegrating yet ever expanding
town and a broken home. What Mark Arax achieves with his own life is a
courageous feat. To defeat the forces of decadence that took his father
away by rejecting that underworld and that easy life. To enter the ranks
of the successful the hard way, by dedication, talent, sweat and toil.

Ironically, Mark might very well have ended up a two bit hood himself and a
cheap hustler hanging around his dad's bar or the golf club, dealing,
racketeering and begging for trouble. Instead, his father's loss jolted
him into a state of permanent revulsion at that seedy world he was just
beginning to get comfortable in at the age of 15. By correctly identifying
it as the prime seducer who claimed his father, Mark avoided that scene and
kept it away from his family. Instead, by finding his deepest roots he has
been able to set some of his own. Let us hope that his tree flourishes
under that hot central California sun and that his children know their dad
for the American hero on the pages of "In My Father's Name," that he surely
is. Read for yourself and see!

Mark Arax's book is a one of a kind. It is a history of a family, a history of the Armenian people, the history of Fresno. The one thing that stands out the most about this book is the stark honesty of it all, so much so that at times the effect on the reader is unsettling. As I read this book I found myself strongly disliking the author and then liking him very much. Filled with many unusual, colorful, complex and interesting characters, this true story at times reads like a novel. The story of how a young man, a newspaper reporter, goes out to find his own father's killers, is the stuff of movies and I am surprised that this book has not been made into a movie. But upon reflection, perhaps this book is too real for Hollywood. I am sure it is too real for some of the local people in Fresno who may feel he has slighted the town. But above all, after reading this book, I was left impressed with the author's toughness, his doggedness, his camera-like mind, his no holds bared approach and his take no prisoners attitude. I would suggest that this book would make very fine reading for anyone interested in California history, and also for any interested in the dark side of small town politics. A well-done, very unusual book.

This is an incredibly personal and moving story about the author's search for his father's killer. I couldn't put it down...and I found myself reliving this amazing journey long after I finished the book. I couldn't stop thinking about all the lives that had been forever changed by a gunman's bullet, most wrenchingly that of a young boy who would making solving this mystery his life's quest.

I had trouble putting the book down, finished reading it last night. I thought it very well written, including descriptions of his family history and cultural backgound that might otherwise have risked being less than interesting. I was particularly taken by his striving to understand all involved and their acts, and not to judge people too simplistically. P.S. Try searching "arax" and "fresno" on the internet... and how can someone who read the book say that the author did not entertain the idea that his father might have been involved in illicit dealings? From the book one can only reasonably say that he did consider this possibility, actively.

In My Father's Name : A Family, a Town, a Murder is a captivating, truth-based who-done-it. But also much more. It's a scrutinizing look at the ugly goings-on in a town gone wrong where the mafia-like police force and city governors were key corrupters. It's also one man's loving account of the inexplicable loss of his father through murder and the loss of his mother after a long battle with cancer.

I felt a sense of loss myself when I finished reading this highly compelling book.

This book a captivating truth-based who-done-it and much more. It's a scrutinizing look at the ugly goings-on in a town gone wrong where the mafia-like police force and city governors were key players. It's also one man's loving account of the inexplicable loss of a father to murder and the loss of a mother after her long battle with cancer.

I felt a sense of loss myself when I finished reading this highly compelling book.

Mark Arax's personal stride to determine who is the murderer of his father is compelling. This excellent book explains who (in Arax's theory) committed this horrible crime. I applaud Arax on his effort to become one with himself, and to expose Fresno for what it really is!

"In My Father's Name" achieves a narrative momentum
that makes it difficult to put down.

Arax slowly reveals Fresno as a highly influential
character on his story's plot.

He also develops his characters well through the
author's slow disillusionment about family
and the compromises that bring people together and
drive them apart.

This book is short on dialogue and very heavy on
narration. In some regards too heavy - to the point
it at times borders on convoluted. However, this
stylistic element makes a book about an old murder
both puzzling and immediate.