Shooting of Rabbit Wells: An American Tragedy

by William Loizeaux

The author of A Daughter's Life, a New York Times Notable Book of 1993, follows the collision course between a black youth and the white police officer who killed him in a sleepy New Jersey suburb in 1972.

Genres: Nonfiction

272 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 2012

About the author

William (Bill) Loizeaux’s third middle-grade children’s novel Into the Wind is forthcoming in March, 2021. Inspired by a feisty aunt who loved painting and sailing, the book is about an unlikely friendship between a ten-year-old boy and an elderly woman.

Bill is an award-winning author of books for children and adults, as well as stories and essays. His children’s novel Wings received the 2006 ASPCA Henry Bergh Award and was the 2006 Golden Kite Honor Book for Fiction. His memoir Anna: A Daughter’s Life was a New York Times Notable Book, and his novel The Tumble Inn was the grand prize winner at the 2015 New York Book Festival. He has been writer-in-residence at Johns Hopkins and Boston University. He lives with his wife in Washington DC.

Reviews

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book after being urged by my mother for years. She grew up in Basking Ridge and was almost 16 when Rabbit was shot, so it's always been a book near and dear to her heart. I don't regret putting it off, though, because I feel like the book mattered more to me now in the wake of all the police violence that has been happening in America. It's crazy to think that this happened over 40 years ago and yet we still have the same problems plaguing our nation today.

The book was a little slow, but well worth the wait. The author does a lovey job telling the story of Rabbit's life, weaving in stories of his own childhood in Basking Ridge that help set the scene. I also think the story is sadly something we can all relate to: a young black man at the height of his youth shot for a crime he didn't commit. I cried reading this book and I cried finishing it. I'm sure part of my reaction is caused by my personal connections to Basking Ridge and Bernardsville and also by the lasting impact it has had on my mother and her personal and political views, and I will admit this book ends with many questions still left, but I still recommend it to everyone. It's a heartbreaking story, and one that never should've needed to be told, but I think it's a story we all need to hear. And despite how somber a story it is, the fact that 40 years later Rabbit is still remembered and the stories of victims like him are being told and being rallied around gives me hope that maybe the world isn't as bad as we think. Maybe someday we can live in a world where there are no more Rabbits.

[Vanetra Malone · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was a good read. I actually felt fluke i personally knew Rabbit. When he was murdered my heart aches. This took place years ago but i feel like this era is being relived now.

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is centered around something that that happened in the town next to my hometown when I was about 10 years old. Bill "Rabbit" Wells, a young man who had grown up at a local home for boys was shot by an only slightly older policeman as he left a bar. The police had been called to respond to a knife fight, and the young man who was killed was leaving the bar with a heavy road sign (which had been dragged in during the fight) over his shoulder. The officer thought he was being threatening, and shot him through the heart. As the book makes painfully clear, he was doing nothing of the kind; he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The book explores how Rabbit Wells came to be in that place -- a mixed-race child in an almost completely white, affluent (today even more so) area; a young man going out into the world, but still being drawn back to the place that had been his only long-term home. (How completely white? About 20 years after the shooting, and several years before this book was first published, I remember the local newspaper reporting that a biracial woman had been stopped and questioned by police because she was with her own children, whose father was white.)

The author was an acquaintance of the victim and, years later, was still haunted by Rabbit's death. He recreates the town in that era well; some of what he writes about Rabbit is more "informed speculation" than history, but it is plausible. The shooting itself took just a moment to happen, and takes just a moment to read; that it is inevitable from the first page does not make it any less heartbreaking when it happens.

It is, I think, a sign of just how sheltered we were at the time that I remember none of this, although I was living a mile and a half away from where it happened.

The officer who killed Rabbit met with the author several times and seems to have earned his grudging understanding, if not forgiveness. The shooting happened so quickly that it is impossible to know whether Rabbit's race had any role in the officer feeling threatened. It is possible that he would have shot anyone walking out of that bar and holding a large object; but would he have hesitated just a bit if the person had a blond crew cut instead of an afro? The book raises questions that deserve pondering.

[Kimberly Hicks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw this book deal on Bookbub a while back and I thought this would be a great read for Black History Month. I was anxious to start reading it because I was intrigued by the nice-looking young man on the cover. I was determined to find out who this man was and what he meant to this world at one time.

Like so many tragic endings of young African American men, unfortunately for William “Rabbit” Wells, he was the start of many more young lives being snuffed out by some trigger-happy police officer. But his life wasn’t the first and as we already know, he certainly will not be the last, suffice it to say.

I’ve read countless stories like this and it never ceases to amaze me how as I’m reading the words of a human being about to become deceased; I wish I could somehow alter the story so that this person would be able to continue to live. It brings such a huge sense of helplessness, anger and sadness. Hmm, this may lead some of you to wonder why on earth would I read stories like that, if it causes me to have so many emotions? The answer is simple, I want to be educated in knowing what makes human’s tick and how split-second decisions can be the difference between life and death. So many times, we hear these horrendous stories and immediately pass judgment of guilt or innocence, but in these types of moments, it’s not always as clear as one might think.

Rabbit’s life was cut short by a misunderstanding. There were so many forces working against this young man more than fifty years ago. He was guilty, like so many after him, of being at the wrong place and the right time—that time signifying their departure from this earth. God calling his children home. It leaves the rest of us pondering why? The author did his best to answer this question, especially since he knew of the victim. He grew up around Rabbit and went to school together. And therein lies where my issues with this story begins. In fact, I had quite a few issues with this book.

Before I begin, I, in no way, wanted to minimize this brother’s existence, but the fact of the matter is, this story really should have been no more than twenty pages long. Loizeaux didn’t know enough about Rabbit’s life to make a full novel out of it. So, what does he end up doing? He surmises what Rabbit was thinking and feeling in order to fill up the pages. I’m sorry, but that, to me, isn’t doing Rabbit’s life justice. Through his own findings as he takes the reader along, he admits he didn’t know enough and took many creative licenses in the telling of Rabbit’s short life span. That rubbed this reader the wrong way.

What also struck me as odd is his constant description of Rabbit. And I need for you to stay with me here so that what I’m saying is very clear. Rabbit was of mixed race. Anyone looking at the cover of this novel can clearly see he’s of lighter skin, but you can also tell he has black in him. Loizeaux mentioned a lot about how dark Rabbit was. To be fair, seeing as how the author is white, to him Rabbit appeared darker, but trust and believe, that brother was not dark skinned. When I think of chocolate men, Wesley Snipes comes to mind. Morris Chestnut, Taye Diggs, Blair Underwood, to name a few. If you’re not familiar with those African American actors, please look them up. What will become very evident is when you see them and then look at Rabbit, you be the judge on who is “dark” skin. I didn’t like that he depicted him as some overbearing dark figure that all the kids in their white neighborhood were terrified of. Why? Because he was taller and had a muscular physique? An Afro which surrounded his head like a halo? Really? Another thing that struck me as odd was his brutally honest description of some of the people he went to school with that knew Rabbit and he later interviewed. Let’s just say he didn’t describe everyone in a positive light. If I were the one he was describing in the manner in which he did for some of them, I would have been extremely offended. I assume those individuals read his words and were okay with it? It seemed like he was throwing low-key shade at some of them.

Overall, this story wasn’t a bad read. Loizeaux has quite the imagination and I would love for him to author a fictional story because I’m positive he’d be able to hold my interest. He’s a brilliant writer. You cannot deny his writing chops. From his vocabulary and his due diligence in his pursuit and investigation of his long ago school friend, Rabbit. I appreciate what he tried to do with this story, I truly do, but it just wasn’t what I was expecting. Again, when reading stories like this, you have to have so much more information than what Loizeaux was working with, otherwise, you’ll end up with the version that was put before us here.

However, having said that, Loizeaux did an exceptional job in bringing Rabbit to life. After having read his story, I feel a connection to him although we clearly were in a different time and space. It’s apparent that Rabbit touched the lives of many he came into contact with. Obviously so with Loizeaux having taken the time to write about a young black man who died too soon. Like Loizeaux, I wonder what would have become of Rabbit’s life? I imagine he would have had children and became the medical photographer he was grooming himself to be. There are so many what if’s and what should have been, but we’re left with wondering and questioning. His nickname was appropriate because his life was cut short fast. Funny how those things work out sometimes.

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[Sue Lassiter · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a most tragic story. Tragic for everyone involved. Well written, I could see everything in my head. Very sad and very, very, worth reading.

[Benjamin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overdoes the imaginative parts of the recreation of events.

[Suzi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having recently read a FB post about a young man, a year younger than I, who was murdered in my childhood hometown in 1972, I was surprised that I had never heard about it. When I found there was a book written about Rabbit Wells, I was anxious to learn more. I was familiar with Bonnie Brae Farm, having given our horse to the owner, who was an avid horseman and could provide Falcon with the exercise he needed, and I spent many weekends visiting Falcon and riding him on the Farm’s open fields, quite possibly when Rabbit was living there. I was also familiar with the town of Bernardsville where I was raised, and I recognized many of the storefronts and people mentioned in the book. At the time of the shooting, I had graduated from high school and was attending art school in Washington, DC., but my parents and many friends still lived in Bernardsville, and yet I heard nothing of Rabbit Wells and his tragic death. His story is a heart-breaking example of the pointless deaths of so many young African American men in our country. I’ve watched America’s struggle with racial issues and police brutality on the news, but until reading the story of Rabbit Wells, a young man of color struggling to survive in my own white, privileged neighborhood, it hadn’t really hit home for me. The shooting of Rabbit Wells by Officer William Sorgie was ruled an accident, and I appreciate that Loizeaux portrays the police officer as not being racially biased ... but while the shooting may not have been racially motivated, the story certainly highlights racial injustice in America.

Loizeaux is a talented writer who creates a compelling story of the life of Rabbit Wells, certainly portraying him as a likeable, talented, and decent young man worthy of far greater opportunities than he was given. However, lacking a personal account of Rabbit’s life, Loizeaux fabricates too many situations, thoughts, and emotions while building his story, and by doing so, diminishes the reliability of his information. For instance, Loizeaux relays a story of Rabbit getting up on the platform at the fair’s dunking booth. He creates an entire story, making up a fictional narrative between friends as well as Rabbit’s response to the situation. He then states that it’s all illusory … “I’m not sure that he actually did this, but it feels like I saw him there. He was certainly capable of it.” He then states, “This was pure Rabbit, all balls and bluster, marching up on the scaffolding …”. This happens way too often in the book. Admitting that he didn’t know Rabbit well, Loizeaux states that he “came to know him better” by imagining what he was ‘probably’ thinking and what he ‘might’ have been going through. Yikes! While I applaud Mr. Loizeaux’s desire to bring Rabbit’s story to the public, embellishing Rabbit’s character with contrived events and emotions imagined through the eyes of his own very white, privileged childhood, seems presumptuous.

However, despite the frustration of so much speculation of what Loizeaux ��supposed’ Rabbit might have done or felt, 4 stars because he successfully pulls the reader into a powerful story of a charismatic young, black man struggling to overcome childhood poverty and neglect all too common in America, an unfortunate accident, and yet another pointlessly stolen life.

[Graham Oliver · Rating 4 out of 5]

While Loizeaux had to reach a bit to include some of the more tangential material, overall this is a chilling portrait of the little moments that can add up to a tragedy. Sort of like a literary Crash, I suppose.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember Rabbit, and I remember when he was shot.

[Gwen · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a good story, but the author's writing style was just tough to slog through.