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New Book Announcement: The Plan
Contact Susan Klopfer
Cuenca, Ecuador
Words: 68,380 (approximate)
Language: English
ISBN: 9780982604977
Language: English
ISBN: 9780982604977
The Plan: Murder Mystery
Historical Fiction Novel Based on Actual Civil Rights People, Places and Events;
JFK Assassination Explored
A young Cleveland McDowell enters the University of Mississippi as the first black law student; later he was kicked out. Students, he said, had chased with with guns. When he carried a firearm to class, out of self protection, he was expelled. He lost a legal bid to reenter. McDowell was a close friend of James Meredith and Medgar Evers. (Photo, U of M files)
Short Summary of The Plan: The tight bond between Clinton and Joe, two gay,
black lawyers (one of them, married) is broken when Joe is reportedly found
hanged. A suicide seems impossible to Clint, and Joe’s widow is acting cagey.
Clinton Moore believes Joe Means was tortured and murdered because of his and
Joe’s shared obsession—investigating and fact gathering about civil rights cold
case murders and assassinations.
***
The
Plan is based on a real
event that took place in the Mississippi Delta, where author Susan Klopfer and
her psychologist husband lived for two years on the grounds of Parchman
Penitentiary, where Fred Klopfer worked.
The former award-winning Missouri news reporter and Prentice Hall book
editor, asked around about a murder that had taken place in the Delta—a fact
she’d picked up from a new friend.
But all that “Ella’ could say was that “he was a bad man—a gay lawyer.
And he was murdered.”
“Of course, I wanted to hear more. I always like a good story. But
I had to learn who, what, when, where
and why on my own.”
Klopfer began digging to learn the full story, starting with a
telephone call to a local minister’s wife she’d met through a local restaurant
owner. “That would be Cleve McDowell, the first black law student to enter Ole
Miss. He got kicked out!” the wife told her.
“I quickly learned some of this man’s story, but it took months to
put everything together, so that I could make sense of what I’d heard. I had a
feeling that I was the first person to uncover the whole story, as much of it
that was possible to track. Of course I had to search old records, lie it to a
courthouse clerk, and track down several older people who’d known this man. I
eventually got a copy of his autopsy and with the help of a physician and
forensic researcher, I learned that two shooters were probably involved. I also
learned that the autopsy was sloppy and quick. One person went to prison for
this murder, but it looked to me as if the person who shot the fatal bullet got
away.”
Klopfer believes that she has the only existing copy of McDowell’s
autopsy. “The state said it was no longer available, when I asked for a copy.”
Cleve McDowell became the main character—Clinton Moore—in The
Plan. “I changed names, dates and locations, moving the story from Drew to
Clarksdale, but did not change much else, at least in the beginning of the
book. I wanted to remain true to Delta history.”
For instance, The Plan details the murder of a young woman, Jo
Etha Collier, who was brutally killed on the night of her high school
graduation in Drew. More is written about the murder of Mississippi civil
rights icon, Medgar Evers. The Emmett Till lynching is further explored. But
the book finally takes a paranormal turn, Klopfer admits.
The writer, who currently resides as an expat in Cuenca, Ecuador,
said that she picked up a piece of “interesting Mississippi Delta JFK
assassination history” which she weaves into The Plan. “I learned of a Delta
man, a private detective named John D. Sullivan, who ended up working in New
Orleans with key figures named by well-known JFK assassination conspiracy
researchers.” The names, she said, include former FBI agent Guy Banister and pilot
David Ferrie, along with Carlos Marcello, boss of the New Orleans crime family.
Sullivan died from a suspicious gun accident at home, after
returning to the Delta from the Big Easy. “Even Sullivan’s children said they
didn’t believe the story they were told about how their father died. Apparently
Sullivan spent a lot of time with a family friend, a well-known judge, after
coming home before he died. I would love to see the judge’s notes.”
Klopfer believes that “the real Cleve McDowell” easily would have
had contact with Sullivan. “They would not have liked each other. Sullivan was
a right-wing, former FBI agent who was a racist for at least most of his
professional life. The state’s Sovereignty Commission records attest to this,
as do those who gave me interviews. Who knows? Maybe McDowell researched
Sullivan’s strange death and got in over his head.”
The Delta attorney, she says, could have learned something about
the Kennedy or Dr. Martin Luther King assassination. “Or the Emmett Till
lynching. I certainly could not leave out this possibility. He kept in frequent
contact with Emmett Till’s mother, working on this cold case for most of his
professional life. His office was filled with investigation records when he was
killed. Later, many were burned in a dramatic fire,” Klopfer said.
"I learned through all of this that Cleve McDowell was a compassionate man who deserves to be remembered. I want this message to come out of this book. I am surprsed at how difficult it was to find records and stories about him."
The Plan starts in New York City, with a history professor who intends on contacting Moore to congratulate him on his seventy-second birthday. But the professor gets interrupted by the sister of a colleague at Penn State University who disappeared in South America—in the Chilean Andes—in 1985. Trying to assist Boris Weisfeiler’s kin, the professor forgets to call his Mississippi friend.
"I learned through all of this that Cleve McDowell was a compassionate man who deserves to be remembered. I want this message to come out of this book. I am surprsed at how difficult it was to find records and stories about him."
The Plan starts in New York City, with a history professor who intends on contacting Moore to congratulate him on his seventy-second birthday. But the professor gets interrupted by the sister of a colleague at Penn State University who disappeared in South America—in the Chilean Andes—in 1985. Trying to assist Boris Weisfeiler’s kin, the professor forgets to call his Mississippi friend.
The Plan moves to the Mississippi Delta. “A murder takes place,
and Clinton Moore narrates the rest of the story. It is his journey to find the
murderer of his best friend, Joe Means. And his own killer, as well,” Klopfer
said.
Klopfer notes that character “Joe Means” is also based on a true
person who she believes also was murdered in Montgomery Alabama. “Henry S. Mims
was a friend of Cleve McDowell’s. They went to school together. It is said he
committed suicide, but after listening to whispers over the phone from a
Huntsville law clerk (where he worked), I don’t believe that story, either.”
Mims also was a lawyer who worked on civil rights cold cases in
his spare time.
The Plan has a gay subtheme. “The Plan is historical fiction. I
took liberties to make it more interesting to readers. But I believe that was
not a big stretch to make. I spoke to various friends and scoured the state’s
Sovereignty Commission files to make this decision.”
Is a sequel in the works? “Definitely,” Klopfer says.
The Plan, as it moves from the Delta to Ecuador, has a strong link
to Chile, where recent trials have taken place over a Chilean and German-run
terrorist/torture camp, by the name of Colonia Dignidad.
“Look this up on the Internet. Colonia Dignidad exists,” Klopfer says.
“And it is where the sequel begins.”
The Plan
Words: 68,380 (approximate)
Language: English
ISBN: 9780982604977
Language: English
ISBN: 9780982604977
