For the aspiring young reporter, the world of community newspapers
seems like a strange alternate universe. Instead of writing about
international arms treaties, high political scandal, or the film
star du jour, you're stuck trying to find weighty words to describe
a Girl Scout bake sale, a city council zoning debate, or the local
junior high's production of Grease (with all the naughty
stuff taken out, of course). Many a J-school graduate has been
quickly disillusioned upon assignment of their first puff piece on
a car dealership, supermarket, or real estate broker. They're what
Akst calls the "holy trinity" of community newspapers everywhere,
and not coincidentally usually the biggest advertisers.
   
But given the distance of time and experience, any Mencken wannabe
will see the value of community newspapers and covering the events
and people with more of a direct influence on one's life than
what's going on across the state line or the nearest ocean. And
it's that kind of newspaper that's at the center of this novel,
under the stewardship of former big city reporter Terry Mathers, as
editor, and his estranged wife Abigail, as publisher. Their
floundering weekly seems destined for failure, with the hottest
local story being the imminent takeover of the local department
store by a Wal-Mart like national chain. But when a respected local
day care becomes the target of a wild string of rumors concerning
child abuse, it sets off a sense of hysteria in the town and its
leading citizens --- and their paper, The Webster Chronicle,
is ground zero for the story.
   
Taken as strictly that, this book had the potential to be an
insightful and compelling novel. But Akst's weaknesses in plotting
and characterization ultimately work against such literary
ambitions. To begin with, the allegations against the day care ---
initially made by town citizens with heavily compromised
reputations of their own --- quickly escalate from a spanking
incident to child sex, child porn, ritualism, and Satanism, with
only the bizarre claims of three and four year olds --- highly
suggested by the city's hired sexual abuse advisor --- to back them
up. Mathers must be the most gullible journalist in the world, as
he's all too eager to wholeheartedly accept the charges, in itself
suspect since he also happens to be sleeping with the advisor. But
since Abigail is also enjoying wild sex with the local department
store owner...
   
The novel's biggest weakness, though, seems to lie with Akst's
narrative indecision. Hanging somewhere between straight narrative
and broad satire (it's no coincidence that some of the accused are
also practicing Wiccans), it succeeds at neither. Having Terry's
dad as a disapproving, Walter Cronkite-like broadcast journalist
superstar seems like a blatant grab for another subplot. And Akst's
character dialogue concerning child sexual abuse often reads like a
propagandist textbook usually seen only in the poorer novels of
Andrew Vachss. By the end, of course, Terry is repentant and
abhorrent of the overheated (and, of course, unfounded) scandal
that he has helped create, but his instant conversion rings
false.

Thus, THE WEBSTER CHRONICLE takes a good and even tried idea for
literature, and ultimately fails to deliver. There are many good
points about the book, particularly how unsubstantiated gossip
turns into truth, and how those who are not wholeheartedly with a
"good" cause then must be seen as against it (woe be to the citizen
of Webster not sporting a "Believe the Children" button). But
overall, Akst's reach as an author exceeds his grasp as a writer
--- with the same outcome, whether he'd been writing for The
Webster Chronicle or The New York Times.