Alexandra Chasin

Assassin of Youth by Alexandra Chasin is a wonderfully enlightening experience on many levels: as history, as biography and as creative literature.

Well researched, the history aspect of this book is as much about the unethical and inequitable justice system as it pertains to drug policy, particularly marijuana. While the larger skeleton of the book is chronological each individual document, around which each chapter is developed, is analyzed in a much broader scope than simply its place in a chronological story. These connections become ever more important as the work goes on.

As a biography it certainly focuses on Harry J. Anslinger as the originator (an originator?) of the racist system put in place and perpetuated still today. It is the interplay between the subject of the history and the subject of the biography where the real reward comes for the reader.

The creative manner in which Chasin presents facts and consequences coupled with well-grounded conjecture makes this a pleasure to read. We are asked to creatively read and think about what we have read. If the reader does so it is difficult to see the system under consideration as anything but a racist bureaucratic/legal framework to disenfranchise and criminalize a large portion of the American population.

I would highly recommend this to people who like their biographies to be something more than just a regurgitation of a person's life. This will also be an enjoyable read for history buffs. Actually, I would recommend this to everyone who cares at all about how an unequal justice system came about and how we might make the system fair and functional.

Reviewed from a copy made available through Goodreads First Reads.… (más)