The true-crime podcast “Serial” was a phenomenon, in part, because it was told in the first person. The narrator, Sarah Koenig, all but whispered the story into our ears, and her brainiac sensibility was as interesting as the killing at her story’s core. Her uncertainty was fetching on an existential level.
Jill Leovy’s powerful new book, “Ghettoside,” also relates the story of a murder, this time of a young black man in South Los Angeles. It’s possible to admire “Serial” while praising Ms. Leovy as the anti-Koenig. The depth of the reporting and analysis in “Ghettoside” makes “Serial,” by comparison, resemble a book of poetry.
“Ghettoside” is old-school narrative journalism, told strictly in the third person. It’s as square as a card table. Yet the book is a serious and kaleidoscopic achievement, from a reporter for The Los Angeles Times who’s spent most of her career covering cops and thinking about what their work means.
[For more of this story, written by Dwight Garner, go to http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01...l?ref=books&_r=0]
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