An Intent to Commit

by Bernie Lambek

A kidnapping tale, a critical look at First Amendment rights, and a love story, An Intent to Commit follows the lives of characters who first appeared in Lambek's earlier novel, Uncivil Liberties , a 2018 indie bookstore bestseller and Foreword Reviews 2018 Indies Book of the Year Award Winner!
Sarah Jacobson is analytical, headstrong, and courageous. She is an organizer with Green Mountain Black Lives Matter and works with Vermont high school students to advance racial justice. As local schools raise the BLM flag, Sarah and her organization face hatred, hostility, racism, and antisemitism. When Sarah is kidnapped, her tender-hearted partner, Ricky Stillwell, must stand up against the hatred and fear in order to find her. This timely, engaging, and thought-provoking novel is at once a mystery, a dialog on legal theory, a study of white supremacy, and an exploration of young romance.

176 pages, Paperback

Published October 26, 2021

About the author

Bernie Lambek grew up in Montreal, the son of Jewish refugees from Nazi Europe. He studied philosophy at Dartmouth College, lived on a communal farm, and taught fourth grade for several years. He later attended Yale Law School, where he published articles on civil disobedience and international human rights.

After judicial clerkships, including with Judge Fred Parker on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, Lambek has practiced law at Zalinger Cameron & Lambek in Montpelier, Vermont, for the past 25 years. He represents a number of school districts around Vermont, occasionally dealing with issues of student speech and religion in the schools. In a 2012 lawsuit, Lambek and ACLU colleagues successfully challenged the practice of holding official prayer at town meeting in Vermont.

Lambek serves on the Boards of the Vermont ACLU and the Green Mountain Film Festival. His wife, Linda Sproul, is a retired obstetric and pediatric nurse and they have three sons and four grandchildren. He plays table tennis and recently competed in the National Senior Games in Birmingham, AL.

Uncivil Liberties is his first novel.

Reviews

[Sheri · Rating 5 out of 5]

An Intent to Commit by Bernie Lambek

Sarah the daughter of a prominent Attorney, an activist working to make the world a better place. But not everyone is happy with her work. When she gets kidnapped her boyfriend Ricky steps up to try to find her.

The story moves at a fast pace with engaging plot and well developed characters. With current issues, civil, rights and hatred spreading in the Country, An Intent to Commit felt as if this is a true story. I highly recommend to all.

[Laura Stevenson · Rating 4 out of 5]

As this intricately-plotted book opens, Sarah Jacobson is kidnapped at a gas station near Randolph, Vermont by a man with a gun who quietly slips into the back seat of her car, directs her to a nearby commuter parking lot, and abducts her. Readers soon learn that Sarah is the daughter of Sam Jacobson, the central figure in Lambek’s earlier novel Uncivil Liberties, and that she is the partner of Ricky Stillwell, whom Sam defended. Sarah and Ricky have moved back to Montpelier from Providence, because Sarah has been offered a job as a youth organizing coordinator for Green Mountain Black Lives Matter. Shortly after Sarah begins work, the students in her group raise a Black Lives Matter flag on the flagpole of Montpelier High School. Encouraged by the gesture, other Vermont schools begin to work towards racial inclusion, and Sarah travels to schools all over the state, helping them formulate their plans. Partly due to Sarah’s work, there is a tremendous amount of support for BLM—but at a second BLM flag-raising in June, Sarah is disturbed to find a large number of protesters outside the school gates, including a man with a White Patriots sign, illustrated by a swastika.

The backlash Sarah has seen after the summer flag-raising escalates in the fall. A gun rights group at Montpelier High demands to fly a flag supporting gun rights; when the demand is refused, a lawyer representing a gun-rights student and a group called Second Amendment Inc., sues the school. His argument is that the flagpole is a public forum, and that therefore, in denying the dissenting students the right to fly their own flag, the school is violating the students’ rights of free speech. What follows, in this book as in Lambek’s previous novel, yields fascinating insight into the legal arguments that limit First Amendment rights. Is a school’s flagpole a public forum? Or is it like a school newspaper, in which certain articles inimical to the school’s purpose can be legally withdrawn? Or, in another case discussed, is a public park a public forum, or can it legally prevent certain monuments from being raised within its confines? These definitions, meticulously drawn from the law books discussed by Tad Sorowski, the lawyer for the school, Sam Jacobson, and Sam’s legal partner Alicia, whom Sarah has asked to support her BLM group, form the intellectual center of the book. But outside law offices, something nastier is going on. First Sarah, then Tad Sorowski, then a BLM student begin to receive threatening racist and antisemitic hate mail. To defend them, Alicia takes up a case which gives the book its title: it defines a “true threat” as one that expresses “an intent to commit unlawful violence” on a person or group. Sarah’s kidnapping proves that hate mail is not a matter of free speech; it is a crime.

If Lambek’s book were concerned only with legal arguments, it would lack the pace necessary to crime fiction. Sarah’s experiences as a kidnap victim keep up the plot’s pace, and the relationship between Ricky and Sarah explores both their characters in detail. All the characters, in fact, are clearly dear to Lambek’s heart, and with reason. They are intelligent, compassionate and charming people who live in a small capital city described in such detail that readers come to feel they know every coffee shop and bakery. The warmth of the town adds background to the case: even in this friendly Vermont city, there is an undercurrent of hate that for all the kindness and intelligence of the characters, gives An Intent to Commit a disturbing timeliness.

Read all my reviews of Vermont authors at www.lauracstevenson.org

[Dan · Rating 2 out of 5]

The story is about a kidnapping of a woman, Sarah, who is an activist for BLM and white supremacy. It reads more like a factual news story than a novel. A lot of background filler, as I would call it that doesn’t move the plot. Didn’t think it was a mystery. Also, the partner looking for her happens near the end of the book, and is not the primary plot. There are thought provoking questions with especially what is happening in our country now, but I couldn’t get into the story, plot or even the characters. It was a quick read but left me empty.

[Debbie Maskus · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have read some amazing books, but An Intent to Commit by Bernie Lambek does not fall under that category. The novel is extremely short but too much dialogue and too many legal cases for this lay person. The story rambled and I quickly lost interest. The foul language and intimate scenes populated too much of the story. I found no redeeming quality in this story.