Slipping Into Darkness
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REVIEW BY BRETT PERUZZI
M. Rutledge McCall, like Dante, has visited hell and emerged to tell the tale of what he saw. For McCall, hell was not underground, but in the South Central, Compton and Watts ghettos of Los Angeles, mere minutes by car from his comfortable middle-class existence. Unlike Dante, of course, McCall was not guided by a poet like Virgil. Instead, the educated white professional won the trust of a group of hard-core black and Latino gang members and became their friend and confidant. Along the way, he crossed over the line from being an observer out to research a book to being a participant in the gangbanger lifestyle. Like Hunter S. Thompson before him, McCall immerses himself totally in the milieu he is writing about. He ends up not only spending large amounts of time with the gang members, but also drinking heavily and taking drugs. He begins carrying a pistol, which he doesn't hesitate to use to defend himself or his newfound friends. Slipping Into Darkness brilliantly portrays a life and a place that most Americans can only imagine. Filled with brutal details of gang life from the author's first-hand experience, the book is buttressed by footnoted research from other sources. McCall, who tape-recorded many of his conversations with the gang members, faithfully renders much of the book's extensive dialogue in the street dialect of the gangs. After more than a year of running with the gangsters, McCall's experience on the streets reaches its climax during the L.A. riots of 1992 that broke out after the Rodney King verdict was announced. More than just an outside observer, his on-the-scene perspective of this explosion of urban violence is stunning. Meanwhile, his gradual drift into the gang lifestyle takes a toll on his life. His marriage collapses, and he ends up hospitalized after a suicide attempt. Slipping Into Darkness ends with an epilogue that tells what happened to each of McCall's gang friends, many of whom he still keeps in touch with, and includes extensive transcripts of some of his conversations with them and a glossary of gang jargon. From beginning to end, the book is a riveting account of one of America's worst urban nightmares and the people who live in it. Brett Peruzzi is a freelance writer living in Framingham, Massachusetts.
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