Description
Was Donald a traumatized veteran? A victim of abuse in the mental-health system? Was once he a criminal? Mentally sick? Or just eccentric?
Join writer Diane Cameron as she unravels the real story of her stepfather, Donald Watkins, a former Marine who served in China from 1937 to 1939 all through the Japanese invasion. After returning home, Donald’s seemingly normal life took a sharp turn when he murdered his first wife and partner’s mother in 1953. As punishment for his crime, he spent twenty-two years at Fairview State Hospital for the criminally insane.
Donald’s story traverses continents and decades. Years after his release from Farview, Cameron’s stark examination of her relationship with Donald and her mother highlights the far reach of mental illness. Her in-depth research and keen insight will stir public debate about what is going on these days and what we will be able to expect as the have an effect on of war trauma for veterans and their families unfurls and detonates.
Diane Cameron is an award-winning columnist. An excerpt from Never Leave Your Dead was first published in the Bellevue Literary Review and Was once nominated for a 2006 Pushcart Prize.