May 12, 2022
Can Fiction Help Solve the Ethical Problems of True Crime?
True crime wants us to believe that our monsters are individual, not systemic—the errant serial killer rather than a violent and inequitable culture.
Katie Gutierrez lives in San Antonio, Texas, with her husband, one-year-old daughter, and two dogs. Katie has an MFA from Texas State University, and her fiction and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Catapult, Washington Post, Lit Hub, Motherwell, and more. She is working on a novel while her baby naps. Find her on Twitter @katie_gutz.
True crime wants us to believe that our monsters are individual, not systemic—the errant serial killer rather than a violent and inequitable culture.
Her mother had never curved a cool hand around Marilinda’s cheek and promised, Mijita, your life will be swollen with love.
Something unexpected cracks me open every year: Tonight, it was my daughter, recognizing the name I’d given her because I couldn’t give her the woman herself.
In my frightened mind, so many people in my family had been reduced to that one word.
