I’ve sold a lot of books working David’s corner, and I’m continually trolling for the next one-sided fight to send him into, the next Goliath begging for his comeuppance. There will never be a shortage of uneven conflicts, and they often make for great theater. Who doesn’t love another version of the classic Bible story? It is so ingrained in the American psyche that we instinctively pull for the underdog, often with warts and all.
In another career, I was a lawyer in a small office in a small town. My clients were working people who couldn’t pay fees but wanted me to fix their legal problems anyway. On the other side of the street were corporations with plenty of money. Each day was another adventure as David and I squared off against the Philistines. Together, we sued insurance companies, banks, utilities, hospitals, manufacturers, railroads, pharmaceutical companies, property developers, and incompetent doctors. Winning was always difficult, but we got enough verdicts to stay in business.
I cut my teeth punching up, and so I was naturally drawn to stories of other lawyers who took on the Goliaths. The first one I remember was A Civil Action, Jonathan Harr’s classic nonfiction account of environmental pollution and litigation near Boston. Published in 1995, the book found a wide audience, won awards, and was adapted into a fine movie starring John Travolta and Robert Duvall. I’ve read it several times and obviously admire it, but it has one huge problem: Goliath wins.
Wastelands is even better. It is the uplifting, round-by-round true story of a bunch of rural plaintiffs with no money and seemingly little hope, and the lawyers who smelled injustice and went to war on their behalf. In terms of pure storytelling, this book has all of the crucial elements that writers of fiction constantly struggle to find:
First, there is the tort, the wrongdoing, the pollution. There is the unregulated, wholesale destruction of property values and quality of life by two thousand commercial hog farms in eastern North Carolina.
Second, there are the sympathetic victims, the five hundred or so small landowners unlucky enough to have their lives ruined by massive hog farms next door.
Third, there are delightfully evil bad guys. It is difficult to utter the phrase “Big Pork” without conjuring up all manner of images, none of them good. But Big Pork is king in hog country, and its advocates and apologists get their just rewards in this story. Goliath has never looked so bad.
Fourth, there are the warriors who step into the ring and battle against heavy odds. For thirty years, Mona Lisa Wallace and her partner, Bill Graham, have fought to protect the poor, the injured, the mistreated. They have won big verdicts and even bigger settlements.
Nothing, though, prepared them for their epic battle against Big Pork.
Never in my most creative moments could I have assembled such a colorful and memorable cast of characters, and then blessed them with so riveting a set of facts, and then guided them through the ins and outs and uncertainties of high-stakes litigation.
Beautifully written, impeccably researched, and told with the air of suspense that few writers can handle, Wastelands is a story I wish I had written.
March 3, 2021