My guest author today is Keith Smith. Keith is a Vice President with Fiserv, a Fortune 500 technology services company based in Jersey City, New Jersey. He has extensive experience in Capital Markets and Wealth Management, experienced gained from career assignments in Chicago, Dallas, New York, Princeton, London and Zurich.
He was a Vice President with Merrill Lynch Capital Markets, working with institutional investors in the United States and overseas; a Regional Vice President working with Fidelity’s institutional clients in Manhattan; a Senior Financial Advisor with Merrill Lynch Global Private Client Group working with individual investors in Princeton; and a First Vice President with Merrill Lynch Global Wealth Management overseeing Trading Services for more than 16,000 financial advisors worldwide.
He holds the Investment Management Consultants Association’s Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA) designation, graduating from the program administered by the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He received a BA in Political Science from Providence College. He has completed the Advanced Management Program plus the Securities Industry Institute at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and holds FINRA Series 7, 24 and 65 licenses.
Active in his community, Smith is a Trustee of a Lawrenceville-based social service agency which provides crisis intervention counseling services to children who are victims of sexual assault.
I know by now most of my readers are wondering why someone with your impressive business credentials chose to write a novel. It doesn’t seem like a logical fit, but I know there is much more about you that inspired your writing. You have a compelling, personal story that is behind your novel. Tell us in your own words.
KS: Men in My Town is my first novel and I needed to write it for a number of reasons. First, it’s a good story worth telling. It’s a gripping suspense novel with a storyline that includes characters based on real people, real places and real events. It’s a glimpse into the street hustle hiding in the peaceful suburbs of Providence, Rhode Island in the 1970’s, complete with gamblers, bookies, car thieves, petty criminals, organized crime, hard-working honest men, a twice-convicted sex offender and a murderer or two.
Secondly, Men in My Town is my personal story. I am the 14-year-old boy in the story and only a few people, very few people, know what really happened to me on that cold winter night in 1974. I wrote Men in My Town to stop keeping this secret from the people closest to me, people I care about, people I love, my long-time friends and my family.
And finally, I wrote the story to raise awareness of male sexual assault, to let other victims know that they’re not alone and to help all victims of rape and violent crime understand that the emotion, fear and memories that may still haunt them are not uncommon to those of us who have shared a similar experience.
MA: Tell us about the story.
KS: Men in My Town is a suspense novel based on the true story of the abduction, beating and sexual assault of a 14-year-old boy in Lincoln, Rhode Island in 1974 and the brutal unsolved murder of his attacker in Providence in 1975.
The story focuses on the young boy’s relationship with a few men in his town, men who are close to the boy and his family, men who watch over him, men that protect him after he’s been assaulted. They’re good men with the capacity to do bad things. It’s a story that causes the reader to revisit their position on the question, “Does the end ever justify the means?” and vividly juxtaposes the good and evil that can exist simultaneously in every man.
MA: Who are the heroes in the novel?
KS: The hero, and other characters in Men in My Town have been described as Runyonesque, after Damon Runyon’s depiction of street life in Brooklyn and midtown Manhattan in the 1930’s and 40’s. Their strengths and weaknesses? They’re moral men with personal flaws, driven by their own sense of right and wrong which at times is at odds with the law.
MA: Obviously your novel is based upon real people and real events. Care to tell us more about how these factors affected the story development?
KS: Absolutely. The plot is based on actual events. I was abducted, beaten and raped by a stranger. It wasn’t a neighbor, a coach, a relative, a family friend or teacher. It was a recidivist pedophile predator who spent time in prison for previous sex crimes; an animal hunting for victims in the quiet suburbs of Providence, Rhode Island.
I was able to identify the guy and the car he was driving. He was arrested and indicted but never went to trial. His trial never took place because he was brutally beaten to death in Providence before his court date. 36 years later, no one has ever been charged with the crime. Someone got away with murder.
Men in My Town is my personal story, a story told from my heart, about the emotion, fear, guilt and horror I experienced, and the silence I’ve maintained since I was abducted, beaten and raped on that dark, cold winter night in 1974.
MA: Yours is such a compelling story. Do you have any writing plans beyond Men in My Town?
KS: I’m not writing right now but I am speaking publicly about what happened to me hoping to help others make the transition from ‘victim’ to ‘survivor.’ I’ve done newspaper interviews, talk radio, college campus events and I’m active in the RAINN Speakers Bureau. RAINN, the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network is the nation’s largest anti-sexual assault organization. RAINN operates the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1.800.656.HOPE and the National Sexual Assault Online Hotline at rainn.org. RAINN leads national efforts to prevent sexual assault, improve services to victims and ensure that rapists are brought to justice.
MA: Is there anything else you’d like to add?
KS: Despite what happened that night and the constant reminders that continue to haunt me years later, I wouldn’t change what happened. The animal that attacked me was a serial predator, a violent pedophile trolling my neighborhood in Lincoln, Rhode Island looking for young boys. He beat me, raped me, and I stayed alive. I lived to see him arrested, indicted and murdered. It might not have turned out this way if he had grabbed one of my friends or another kid from my neighborhood. Perhaps he’d still be alive. Perhaps there would be dozens of more victims and perhaps he would have progressed to the point of silencing his victims by murdering them.
Out of fear, shame and guilt, I’ve been silent for over three decades, sharing my story with very few people. No more. The silence has to end. What happened to me wasn’t my fault. The fear, the shame, the guilt have to go. It’s time to stop keeping this secret from the people closest to me, people I care about, people I love, my long-time friends and my family. It’s time to speak out to raise public awareness of male sexual assault, to let other survivors know that they’re not alone and to help survivors of rape and violent crime understand that the emotion, fear and memories that may still haunt them are not uncommon to those of us who have shared a similar experience.
MA: Keith, thanks so much for sharing your heartfelt personal story. I wish you the very best with your writing as well as with your advocacy on behalf of victims of sexual assault. My readers can learn more about Keith and Men in My Town at his website: www.MenInMyTown.wordpress.com
Read More →
