Run, Brother, Run: A Memoir of a Murder in My Family

Written by David Berg

Narrated by Geoffrey Alan Berg

As William Faulkner said, “The past is not dead, it’s not even past.” This observation seems especially true in matters of family, when the fury between generations is often never resolved and instead secretly carried, a wound that cannot heal. For David Berg, this is truer than for most, and once you listen to the story of his family, you will understand why he held it privately for so long and why the betrayals between parent and child can be the most wrenching of all.

In 1968 David Berg’s brother, Alan, was murdered by Charles Harrelson, a notorious hit man and father of actor Woody Harrelson. Alan was only thirty-one when he disappeared; six months later his remains were found in a ditch in Texas.

Run, Brother, Run is Berg’s story of the murder. But it is also his account of the psychic destruction of the Berg family by the author’s father, who allowed a grievous blunder at the age of twenty-three to define his life. The event changed the fate of a clan and fell most heavily on Alan, the firstborn son, who tried to both redeem and escape his father yet could not.

This achingly painful family history is also a portrait of an iconic American place, playing out in the shady bars of Houston, in small-town law offices and courtrooms, and in remote ranch lands where bad things happen—a true-crime murder drama, all perfectly calibrated. Writing with cold-eyed grief and a wild, lacerating humor, Berg tells us first about the striving Jewish family that created Alan Berg and set him on a course for self-destruction and then about the gross miscarriage of justice that followed.

As with the best and most powerfully written memoirs, the author has kept this horrific story to himself for a long time. A scrappy and pugnacious narrator, Berg takes his account into the darkest human behaviors: the epic battles between father and son, marital destruction, reckless gambling, crooked legal practices, extortion, and, of course, cold-blooded murder. Run, Brother, Run is a raw, furious, bawdy, and scathing testimonial about love, hate, and pain—and utterly unforgettable.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brilliance Audio
• Release date: Jun 11, 2013
• ISBN: 9781480515710

David Berg

David Berg has tried virtually every kind of civil and criminal case to a verdict, from murder to patent infringement, and he has won hundreds of millions of dollars in verdicts and settlements. He has been recognized by Best Lawyers as one of the “Best Lawyers in America” in nine practice areas. His 2003 book, The Trial Lawyer: What It Takes to Win, is one of the American Bar Association’s bestselling books. In addition, David has published articles and essays in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Litigation Magazine and The Houston Chronicle. He lives in Houston, TX and New York with his wife.

Reviews for Run, Brother, Run

[Annett · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Loved this book about dysfunctional family, redeeming brotherhood & loss

[karconner · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interesting- a lot of lawyerly talk. In some ways it made me mad to see how lawyers break the law just to win, but it was also interesting to see it through a lawyer's eyes.

[sushitori · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This should be titled “Tales of the Brilliant Brother of a Dead Guy. “ Berg spends way more time talking about his successes as an attorney than he does about his older brother’s life and death. His coverage of the trial of Charles Harrelson, the man hired to kill Alan Berg, clearly depicts the corruption of Texas law enforcement and the ethics of criminal jurisprudence at the time. His account of the Berg family is a thought-povoking study of dysfunction. The descriptions of Houston and the surrounding area in the 1970s were fun because I’ve lived here for a long time. But there was too much left unexplored, like the fact that the murderer was the father of Woody Harrelson, the actor. What effect did that have on the actors family and life? But ultimately, the author is always at the center of the narrative. I guess his recognition as “Best Lawyers in America” has gone to his head.

[kraaivrouw · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I had high hopes for Run, Brother, Run - it has all the elements that would make a great story - but I just didn't find it terribly satisfying. Mr. Berg tackles a difficult thing - the murder of his brother at the hands of a killer that went free in a miscarriage of justice. It is not an easy tale, but I believe it deserves a better telling than this one.Run, Brother, Run is at its best when Mr. Berg focuses on his family, his brother, all the ways his family and the events of his brother's murder affected his own life. It's a great and tangled story of divorce, dreams never realized, and family entanglement. Alan Berg is a likeable guy from his brother's description - a bit feckless, more reckless, but likeable - taking after and attempting to defy his father in a struggle that ends in his death.The failures of the book occur as the author smears everyone he has ever known or who touched the case. If you crossed his path he's got an axe to grind (unless you're "Racehorse" Haynes). Next, he retries the case against Charles Harrelson in minute detail with himself cast as the prosecutor. This chunk of the book must have been cathartic for Mr. Berg, but for this reader it was excruciating. The root of the missteps in this book appear to lie in the deep and undying rage that its author holds - rage against everything and everyone (including himself). At its most florid, his rage taints his writing making him supremely unsympathetic. When it is reigned in it provides color and form to the stories he tells. His rage is illustrative of the affects of murder and dysfunction on the people touched by it, but it just isn't all that interesting to watch its owner take it out for a drive.

[akblanchard_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Memoirs that involve dysfunctional families, cold-blooded murders, blatant antisemitism, and miscarriages of justice are not usually described as "enthralling", but this one, surprisingly, is. David Berg, a noted lawyer and writer, tells the story of his family, with a focus on his brother Alan's murder approximately fifty years ago. Berg is a entertaining writer, even when dealing with serious and painful subjects, and he keeps the reader engaged even when recounting the ins and outs of the convoluted murder trial following his brother's death. Berg does get a little bogged down in the legal details and how he would have argued the prosecution's case had it been his to argue. But, on the whole, this absorbing memoir is definitely worth reading.