Independent Reading Response: Road of the Dead by Kevin Brooks

*WARNING: THIS CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS                      

                        Justice is defined as the process or result of using laws to fairly judge
 and punish crimes and criminals. Many people, in modern day, try  their best to establish justice, but few actually succeed. The Road of the Dead by Kevin Brooks is particularly a compelling example of this scenario. This book, The Road of the Dead, is about two brothers, Cole and Ruben, and how they try to find their sister's killer, taking the matters into their own hands. Furthermore, looking on to this book, justice in the book and in modern day might just not be enough and it might not always be what police, judges, or the government want it to be: fair.
                 
                      The book represents some of the social issues our world is facing today.
For instance, murder and rape. In the book, a man named Vince payed people to scare his wife into selling her mother's property, only so he could have plenty of money. But Vince's men though Cole and Ruben's sister, Rachel, was Vince's wife. In the book, it says, ''But instead of just frightening her, he raped her and killed her and left her on the moor.'' This shows how willing  people are when motivated by greed. Vince was willing to have his wife possibly hurt all for money, and because of his greed someone else got raped and killed. This also indicates that there are more social issues going around in the world, than the number of cases actually justified. Some cops don't even know some of the situations behind these murders. For example, the cops in the book had no idea that that all the bribery about money was behind all of this.  Because, sometimes,  the real story isn't discovered, justice may seem unfair. The main person who caused all of this, still doesn't get punished.

                 Because justice may not be something people usually want, or if it doesn't
go as expected, people may try to take matters into their own hands.  For example, in the book, it states that Cole wanted to find Rachel's killer only so the cops would release her body, and his family would be able to bury her. In the book, Cole's mother says, ''I want to bury my daughter because she's dead. She's my daughter. She's dead. I want to bring her back home and put her to rest. Is that so hard to understand?'' And Right after, Cole says, ''I'm going to get Rachel back. That's my way of looking after Mum.'' This shows that Cole  and his mother don't care about Rachel's killer, nor do they want anything to do with him. Knowing Rachel's killer and punishing him, won't do any good for Rachel's family. Because of cops and justice, Cole and his mother won't get to do what they yearned for, to bury Rachel and put her to rest. This leads to Cole talking the law under his own hands, which may not have been the best since that resulted to Ruben's kidnapping.  This indicated that justice in the world is not always perfect and not always what people want. It can result in people taking matters on to their own hands, just like Cole.

            The book, The Road of the Dead, is a good example of our society's definition
of justice. It shows us that the government may believe that justice is only fair and necessary for all crimes. But citizens or people living under the government may disagree. They may think that justice won't help them in their situation. This book also makes me aware of all the injustice going on, there are alot of murders and rape that most police don't even know about. As a final point, The Road of the Dead by Kevin Brooks, represents justice in our society and how people think about it today.