Mrs. Paine's Garage: And the Murder of John F. Kennedy

This excellent inquiry into good and evil in an historical context could not be more timely in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001. I just finished reading this absorbing book in a single sitting--it is both well-written and captivating enough that I hardly noticed the time passing.As an idealist, a humanitarian, and a Quaker, Ruth Paine was in a truly unique position to relate to Marina and Lee Harvey Oswald and their children in 1963. Driven by both a desire to avail herself of an opportunity to learn Russian and an empathy for Marina's plight as an emigre with an abusive husband, Ruth Paine welcomed this troubled couple into the bosom of her family, including her two young children. To say that her trust was betrayed by both Marina and Lee is an understatement. Marina knew about Lee's attempt to murder another public official before JFK and of his possession of a powerful rifle while living in the Paine household, but never revealed either to Paine. Paine went so far as to even find a job for Oswald--with fatal implications, in the Texas School Book Depository.Mallon presents the facts of what happened in the Paine home but also asks critical questions about what the rather naive but charitable Paines knew or should have known up to November 22, when Oswald left their home in the morning with an apparent plan to murder the President. Ruth Paine comes across as perhaps too trusting but also relatively pure of heart; asked about whether she harbors anger or resentment toward Oswald and about what she would ask him in an afterlife, she responds that she got over the anger soon after the event and would want to know "Where are you now in your learning, and your understanding of life?"Mallon has less empathy for Paine's ex-husband Michael, who apparently knew in advance that Oswald had the rifle that would be used to kill JFK and never revealed it until 1993--30 years after the assassination. It is hard to fathom how Michael, even as Ruth's estranged husband, would have so little regard for her safety or that of his children, who lived in the house with the Oswalds--much less the safety of society in general. Mallon speculates that Michael might have succumbed to a family tradition of strangeness--his forbears include Ralph Waldo Emerson and another man intensely interested in ESP and the paranormal. But the book never explains Michael's motives as it convincingly captures Ruth's.It is unfortunate that so many other reviews of this fine book get caught up in the never-ending disputes about whether there was a conspiracy to kill JFK or whether Oswald acted alone. Regardless of where the truth lies in these debates--and I for one believe that we will never completely know what really happened--this book warrants the consideration of thoughtful readers for its many positive attributes.

As I carried this book home from the store (while on a visit to Dallas, mind you), two people I didn't know stopped me on separate occasions to say what a great book it was. I'll agree with them. Although I don't accept Mallon's take on what happened at Dealey Plaza, that issue really isn't important to this particular study. I am thoroughly entranced by his ability to see Ruth and Michael Paine (certainly not your ordinary American couple), and their place in the public story of the assassination, through seemingly fresh and perceptive eyes. Also, Mallon's grasp and conveyance of the moral, social, and political tenor of the times is positively eerie. The first half of the book taking us up to and through the assassination was most disquieting. The second half dispersed the tension.

Thomas Mallon's "Mrs. Paine's Garage" is a short book (or a long essay) with a big reach. It tells the story of how Ruth Paine, a kindly, conscientious Dallas Quaker, took into her house a struggling young couple. They turned out to be Mr. and Mrs. Lee Harvey Oswald. Mallon uses Mrs. Paine's tale as a cross-section of history, a case study in the transformation of America over the last 40 years. We see how dramatically things have changed because of the unmovable guilelessness of the heroine. She was a very smart woman, but there is a sort of Forrest-Gump-like quality to her life--she manages to keep her integrity and honesty while all around her people are giving in to madness. Her goodness sets into stark relief those around her--Oswald's "hideously encumbered soul", Jim Garrison's daffiness. At one point Ruth sees a therapist in order to help her remember more facts about the case--seeking old-fashioned objectivity while the rest of the culture enthrones subjectivity as an ideal. Central to her life was her faith, the quality that allowed her to stand and live a normal life and not be consumed, as so many involved with the assassination were. This is a greatly entertaining, compassionate, and enlightening book, and one that should be read by anyone wishing to understand the differences between myth, history, and memory.

A brilliant book; this has stayed with me in the weeks since I read it. I'm not an assassination buff, and if you'd asked me, I would have said I wasn't that interested in the subject. But the New Yorker piece was so good I HAD to read the book--and the book was even more remarkable. In the life of Mrs. Paine, Mallon has found the perfect vessel to explore the coincidences that haunt every life, the huge resonances one seemingly small choice--befriending a stranger, offering succor to someone in need--can have, and the unintended horrors the best-intentioned acts can wreak. That the book is so elegantly economical, and so beautifully written, makes it that much easier to see the deep story running just below the story of Mrs. Paine's life. Truly this has changed the way I think about innocence and evil.

After I read the excerpt in The New Yorker, I was completely hooked on this story, and the book fulfills the promise of the excerpt. One of the most perplexing things about being human is the way in which a life can be terribly derailed through a series of small errors or accidents. This beautfully written book not only illuminates a bewildering corner of history, but shows some of the costs of being human. Thomas Mallon is compassionate and insightful -- his fiction is rich with history, and his history is as compelling as fiction. Like William Trevor, he examines the world in clear, unsparing detail.His substantial research and his attention to documenting that research makes this the most convincing thing I have read about Kennedy's assassination. I feel like I understand more about history and more about being a human being from this book, and I highly recommend it!