Summary Of A Murder In Virginia By Suzanne Lebsock

A Murder in Virginia: Southern Justice on Trial By Suzanne Lebsock ((New York: W.W. Norton, 2003) Suzanne Lebsock is a historic author that enjoys digging into the past events of the American South. When Suzanne finds something interesting she dives into the history of the event and creates a historic fiction novel, that includes her own ideas and historical facts. Suzanne Lebsock has created more works of art like, “Visible Women: New Essays on American Activism”, “A Share of Honour”, “The Free Women of Petersburg: Status and Culture in a Southern Town”, and finally, “A Murder in Virginia: Southern Justice on Trial”. “A Murder in Virginia: Southern Justice on Trial” takes place in Lunenburg, Virginia in the year of 1895, where a white woman,

The main point was that although African Americas were able to be in society, they were not treated fairly in the legal systems of the United States. Lebsock was trying to portray this by showing that each character was treated in some way unfair, in the justice system. The author spun a tale that reflected pass events that happened in the 1890’s to help bring more clarity to the subject at hand. She brought in real life evidence and accounts to help support her fictional story. The evidence that she used was well research and doubled checked from multiple newspapers, witness accounts, court records, and documents from the time of the murder. With all the evidence gathered and told in such a way a person can understand them, Lebsock was trying to gain the attention of people who would like to go on an adventure on trying to find out the mystery murder. The writing of “A Murder in Virginia: Southern Justice on Trial” is written in such a way that the story gives accounts from the perspective of the characters, along with historical accounts to reinforce the main

It portrays how times have changed for white and African Americans in the American justice system. Suzanne Lebsock did a very thorough job of explain through a story of how different the courts acted depending on a person’s race. It shows the discrimination people showed to other people who were not like them. The way that Lebsock wrote the book is a little confusing at times, because she goes back and forth between ways of explaining a subject. Also, she repeats the same trial base line throughout the entire book, in thus repeating a majority of the book multiple times. Evidence that was provided throughout “A Murder in Virginia: Southern Justice on Trial” was historically accurate in the fact that it relates directly to the case that happened over 121 years ago. Though the author has a main thesis, it is not clearly state in the novel. The reader has to make up their own opinion on what the thesis Lebsock is trying to portray. The style used by Suzanne Lebsock is kind of hard to understand when she jumps back and forth from the story to additional historical evidence. The reader can get easily confused in the context of what is actually going on in the book at that