Defending Alice: A Novel of Love and Race in the Roaring Twenties

“Gripping courtroom drama and social commentary . . . the story flows well . . . [the author is] masterful in building suspense.”—Kirkus Reviews 
Set in 1920s New York, an addictively readable, thoroughly entertaining historical novel involving sex and secrets, race and redemption, and power and privilege—based on a sensational real-life case that made international headlines—in which the marriage between a working-class black woman and the scion of one of America’s most powerful white families ends in a scandalous annulment lawsuit. 
When Alice Jones, a blue-color woman with at least one Black parent marries Leonard “Kip” Rhinelander, the son of one of New York’s most prominent society families, the scandal rocks high society—and eventually sets the city afire when Kip later sues for an annulment, accusing Alice of having hidden her “Negro blood” and intentionally deceiving him that she was white. 
While New York society in the Roaring Twenties witnessed more than a few scandals, the real-life Rhinelander case set tongues wagging and became perhaps the most examined interracial relationship in American history. In Defending Alice, Richard Stratton reimagines this remarkable story, from the couple’s courtship through their controversial marriage to their shocking divorce trial and its aftermath. Chronicled by Alice’s attorney, brilliant trial lawyer Lee Parsons Davis, and told in flashbacks and entries from Alice and Kip’s fictional personal diaries, this epic page-turner vividly brings to life the New York of a century ago—a world seemingly far removed yet tragically familiar to our own. 
Stratton brilliantly evokes this dazzling era in all its glamour and excess, and in retelling the Rhinelander story, explores issues of sex, race, class, prejudice, and justice that are as relevant today as they were a century ago when this headline-making trial took place.

Literature & Fiction

Stratton, Richard

Dramas & Plays

HarperVia

"Gripping courtroom drama and social commentary . . . the story flows well . . . [the author is] masterful in building suspense."--Kirkus Reviews Set in 1920s New York, an addictively readable, thoroughly entertaining historical novel involving sex and secrets, race and redemption, and power and privilege--based on a sensational real-life case that made international headlines--in which the marriage between a working-class black woman and the scion of one of America's most powerful white families ends in a scandalous annulment lawsuit. When Alice Jones, a blue-color woman with at least one Black parent marries Leonard "Kip" Rhinelander, the son of one of New York's most prominent society families, the scandal rocks high society--and eventually sets the city afire when Kip later sues for an annulment, accusing Alice of having hidden her "Negro blood" and intentionally deceiving him that she was white. While New York society in the Roaring Twenties witnessed more than a few scandals, the real-life Rhinelander case set tongues wagging and became perhaps the most examined interracial relationship in American history. In Defending Alice, Richard Stratton reimagines this remarkable story, from the couple's courtship through their controversial marriage to their shocking divorce trial and its aftermath. Chronicled by Alice's attorney, brilliant trial lawyer Lee Parsons Davis, and told in flashbacks and entries from Alice and Kip's fictional personal diaries, this epic page-turner vividly brings to life the New York of a century ago--a world seemingly far removed yet tragically familiar to our own. Stratton brilliantly evokes this dazzling era in all its glamour and excess, and in retelling the Rhinelander story, explores issues of sex, race, class, prejudice, and justice that are as relevant today as they were a century ago when this headline-making trial took place.

Genre Fiction

South America Cichlids: Keeping & Breeding Them in Captivity (Re-615)

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Pets & Animal Care

Tfh Pubns Inc

Hardcover: 64 pages Publisher: TFH Publications (October 1998) Language: English ISBN-10: 0793804078 ISBN-13: 978-0793804078

Aquarium Filtration (Complete Authoritative Guide)

Introducing Cichlids

Beginning With Snakes

The World of the American Pit Bull Terrier

Smack Goddess: A Novel

United States

Birch Lane Press, Carol Publishing Group

Altered States of America is a riveting collection of journalism by outlaw-turned-author Richard Stratton. Stratton's years as an international marijuana smuggler, his 8-year bid in a federal prison system, and subsequent ascendance to acclaimed author and filmmaker, give him the credibility with which to wrest an uncommon truth from his subjects. The stories in this collection read like adventure fiction. To name a few: the story of Greg Scarpa, a Columbo mob captain turned informant; Bonecrusher, a guard at Corcoran penitentiary who witnessed the bloody gladiator fights between convicts; the CIA's top-secret MK-ULTRA program in which the CIA secretly dosed unsuspecting civilians and its own agents with LSD, or the heartbreaking profile of Joe Stassi, America's oldest living gangster, who was ordered to murder his best friend. Each piece is linked by Stratton's reflections on and connections to the people and places he describes. Whether he is talking with Oliver Stone or a prison guard, Hunter S. Thompson or a gangster, Sean Penn or a CIA agent, Stratton has an empathetic understanding of his subjects. This collection truly embodies Bob Dylan's famous line: "To live outside the law, you must be honest."

Altered States of America: Outlaws and Icons, Hitmakers and Hitmen (Nation Books)

Biographies & Memoirs

True Crime

Nation Books

Goodfellas meets Savages meets Catch Me If You Can in this true tale of high-stakes smuggling from pot’s outlaw years. Richard Stratton was the unlikeliest of kingpins. A clean-cut Wellesley boy who entered outlaw culture on a trip to Mexico, he saw his search for a joint morph into a thrill-filled dope run smuggling two kilos across the border in his car door. He became a member of the Hippie Mafia, traveling the world to keep America high, living the underground life while embracing the hippie credo, rejecting hard drugs in favor of marijuana and hashish. With cameos by Whitey Bulger and Norman Mailer, Smuggler’s Blues tells Stratton’s adventure while centering on his last years as he travels from New York to Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley to source and smuggle high-grade hash in the midst of civil war, from the Caribbean to the backwoods of Maine, and from the Chelsea Hotel to the Plaza as his fortunes rise and fall. All the while he is being pursued by his nemesis, a philosophical DEA agent who respects him for his good business practices. A true-crime story that reads like fiction, Smuggler’s Blues is a psychedelic road trip through international drug smuggling, the hippie underground, and the war on weed. As Big Marijuana emerges, it brings to vivid life an important chapter in pot’s cultural history.

Smuggler's Blues: A True Story of the Hippie Mafia ((Cannabis Americana: Remembrance of the War on Plants, Book 1) (1)

Professionals & Academics

Arcade

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Books by Stratton, Richard