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Summary: For those who love Jerry Springer.....
Review: This book has all the ingrediants of a Jerry Springer show. All you are missing is an audience whooping and yelling throughout the story, which is well written overwise. It introduces a vulgarly horrific tale and then attempts to soften the image of the protagonist. I guess a Nightmare on Elm Street can have a meaningful and spritually uplifting twist to it too, if written correctly.
Rating: 
Summary: told with a novelist's deft touch
Review: Julie Salamon has written a complex tale with towering themes of love, guilt, death, and grace. Her narrative is deftly written, with a novelist's tools of color and tone. This is one of the best books you will read this year. "The human condition" has rarely been illuminated in such a gifted manner. Kudoes and high marks!
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Summary: Too discursive
Review: "Facing the Wind" by Julie Salamon is a well intentioned and well written account of a father's brutal and deliberate killing of his wife and three children--one of whom was born with multiple handicaps and was severely impaired--his subsequent incarceration in a mental hospital--and eventual release back into society after two and a half years and attempts to be reinstated as an attorney. It is also the story of a group of women who formed a "support group" because THEIR children were similarly handicapped, and how they came to admire the Rowe family because of the loving sacrifices both Rob Rowe and his wife,Mary, made to care for their multiply handicapped son,Christopher, as well as other children. Quite frankly, I found the book disappointing. Instead of focusing primarily on Rob Rowe and the legal and moral issues involved in mounting an "Insanity Defense"--Julie Salamon spends an endless amount of time delving into the lives and personalities of the women in the "Support Group" which the Rowe's joined. Who really CARES about THEM? The story of the Rowes is what's really important. I know most of the reviewers who have already reviewed her book will probably disagree with me, but except for the parts dealing specifically with the Rowe's and the woman whom he eventually married after he was released from the mental institution, I found all the details about the Support Group to be largely UNNECESSARY AND IRRELEVANT to the main story, namely the killing of the Rowe children, the issues involved in his determing his innocence or guilt, and the aftermath of the tragedy. This is not a very satisfying book because Julie Salamon simply SPREADS HERSELF TOO THIN!
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Summary: Human Tragedy
Review: This book is very haunting in its so detailed description of mental illness at its very core. There is no morality question to be answered here. I feel had he lived, Robert Rowe would have gone on & found a reason to kill his second wife & child. When you look at the horrific crime he committed, you are looking at what he did from a 'logical mind', with mental illness there is never logic. Go read case files & histories on mental patients who are in Forensic Centers for committing the same or similar horrific crimes & you will begin to understand Robert Rowe much better. The tragedy here is the state of New York & how he was able to leave that Forensic Center. He should have been there for life as are others who have committed such horrific crimes. Julie Salamon did an excellent job in her information gathering for her book. I am still haunted by this tragic story after having read the book. Hopefully the right state officials in New York read this book.
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Summary: more than lives up to advance praise
Review: This is one of those rare books that really does live up to the hype and praise on its jacket. It is impossible to put down wheile you're reading it and just as hard to let go of once you've finished. It is an insult to call this a true-crime book, despite the fact its central story is about a man who snaps and murders his wife and three children. Like real life, this is about so much more: expectations not reached, pain, sacrifice, love, fear, redemption, the limits of forgiveness and how none of us are the sum of any one thing we have done, no matter how noble or horrific. Julie Salamon is a wonderful writer and storyteller and while the utter darkness of the book's cetral story will no doubt scare away many potential readers, this is one I would heartily recommend to anyone who is brave enough to tackle it. The rewards are many, about as much as one can possibly expect from a riveting piece of non-fiction masterfully told.
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Summary: KEEP A LITTLE PIECE OF YOUR MIND OPEN PLEASE
Review: by Patti Lynn
This book is amazing...and was not the story I expected when I started reading. Julie Salamon is an artist in the difficult art of presenting a non-biased perspective from everyone involved in a story. Anyone I've told about this book seems to react the same: THE GUY/FATHER/HUSBAND WAS OBVIOUSLY A MANIAC. SIMPLE, CUT & Dry LUNACY ... MANIPULATOR. I thought that too. UNTIL, I sat down and listened to the people talking to Salamon. Like most crimes of passion, we want it to be understandable, predictable...that human urge for a chance to say: OF COURSE! I TOLD YOU SO! I KNEW IT WOULD BE LIKE THAT. WHAT WERE you THINKING? Our entire system ...personal, professional police and lawyers and witnesses, parents and peers strives for that intuition for blame-placing. We are very uncomfortable with the random and inexplicable courses of nature, psychology, feelings, and that everlasting divide of nature vs. nurture. Remember The Bad Seed? Remember the hindsight accounts from mothers and neighbors of Ted Bundy? Jeffrey Dahmer? Sad but true, the recipe which concocts heinous acts of human against human usually do not add up. that;s why each of us is so intriqued by true crimes. Explaining behaviors is not a complete or fool-proof or logical study...no matter how badly we want it to be. THIS BOOK FORCED ME TO ADMIT THESE TRUTHS AND TO BE A LITTLE MORE UNDERSTANDING TOWARD PEOPLE WHO SUCCESSFULLY BEAR PAINFUL LIVES, THOSE WHO GO POSTAL, AS WELL AS THOSE WHO COME THROUGH WITH MIRACULOUS STRENGTH. Are YOU ever absolutely sure how you would react in a situation? Ever done anything out of your character and wonder where your behavior came from? Anyone who has experienced depression or some brush with mental deficiency--permanent or temporary or treatable...will tell you the only way to understand actions like these SO HORRIBLE is to hold tight onto a benefit of doubt, the chance of no explanation ever, or simple FORGIVE AND FORGET? This book affected me in deep primal ways like hardly anything else ever has. A lynchpin for my morals that reminds me to keep some grey areas open and not always strive for black and white positions in important contexts like DEATH PENALTY, ABORTION, MERCY KILLING, FORGIVING FAMILY AND FRIENDS WHO'VE HURT MY FEELINGS.<[...] JUDGEMENT is a tricky business. Did Mr. Rowe really need to kill his family to protect them from his lack of ability to provide? Did the teens kill because of the music or the videogames? We won't ever really know the truth about WHY. And that's what I loved about FACING THE WIND. It provides insight into amazing love and strength on the part of the mothers and children and amazing hate and weakness on the part of others AND SOME PEOPLE IN THE MIDDLE WITH NO GREAT HEROIC MOTIONS BESIDES BASIC HUMAN COMPASSION. Is anyone here more or less justified? Were they victims or heroes? Is it good ebough that they did what they could at that moment in that context? The positions are mercurial and that's okay. Julie Salamon confirms for me that it's okay to not have a firm position, just important to consider as many sides as possib;le and not shut off to added information forever into time. My favorite genius scientist is Richard P. Feynman. He's figured out many things in laws of physics and THEORIES of physics. I've admired his intelligence for years. I was thrilled one morning to read one of his essays about the MEANING OF SCIENCE AND THINGS. Although he spent most of his career proving truths, he most impressed me with his idea that scientists and theologians, and all humans should understand and accept varying degrees of knowledge and being comfortable with sometimes not knowing absolutes and keeping open to shifts in judgements and explanations. As for this author not providing more historic and first-hand information from Bob Rowe's remaining family, it seems clear to me that Ms. Salamon attempts to include viewpoints from all sides, even rather peripheral characters like the ocularist, it does not seem likelty that she'd choose to not include information that was available. I assume other people close to Bob Rowe did not offer the author insight at all. The most impressive aspect of this author,to me, is her enriched language and storytelling while never preaching her own personal judgement on the case. READ "FACING THE WIND".....AND THINK AND DISCUSS.....PLEASE!!!
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: As a psychotherapist, I was quite anxious to read this book. My disappointment stems from the fact that there were no real answers - I could not discern the redemption and reconciliation, only the unanswered questions and the cycle of despair. The story was interesting but I had hoped for a much more in depth examination of Bob Rowe.
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Summary: Readable and thought-provoking
Review: I liked this book very much. I appreciated the way she told the stories and feelings of all the people involved in the story and could feel for them all.
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Summary: Well written but lacking in some areas
Review: This book was well written, very engaging and unforgettable. Bob Rowe comes across as a highly intelligent man....sometimes too intelligent. How could a man suddenly "snap" and blame it on a dead women ( his mother ) who was no longer around to defend hereself? And he was a lawyer? Sounds a bit fishy to me. The dead can't speak so I guess we'll have to buy what Julie Saloman is dishing out here. The book is well researched and non judgemental....although its strange that NONE of the surviving Rowe family were interviewed for this book ( except for the deranged rantings of Rowes second wife Colleen who does a fine job painting Bob Rowe as some kind of saint ) I highly recommend the book as it is not your typical "true crime" book but I'd like to have some holes filled in for me....where are the people in this book who havent had their chance to speak yet? I'd like to read their book!
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Summary: grace, guts, and moral ambivalence
Review: This is an unusual book, similar to The Adversary, also an account of a man murdering his family in France. In this book, the group of women bonded by their handicapped chldren are heroines to be sure; they should be the primary subject. My problem is with the moral ambivalence of so many people, nearly all we meet but the women's group and one young lawyer who eventually got Bob Rowe disbarred. Rowe murdered his family, was aquitted by reason of insanity, but went on to live a full if troubled life. He himself saw no reason why he should not be allowed to again practice law and many friends, old and new, spoke out in his behalf. The man was a cold-blooded murderer, no matter how depressed and stressed he was. That there are people who can forgive this heinous a crime is a mystery to me and is a dismal reminder of the moral relativism our society has come to embrace.
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