THURSDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2012, 12:00 AM


It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Well, mainly it was the worst of times. How good can things be when old man Death hangs out for beers every day at the local pub? At least that's how it seems to me.

Anyway, I guess I have a certain outlook on things because of what I do. My name is Jack Crowley, and like most people in this town, I'm a disillusioned mesothelioma lawyer.

The town is called Mesothelioma Lawyers, New York. Yeah, I know, that name makes it sound like our town lost a bet or something. We never get visitors here anymore, but back when we did, they invariably asked about the peculiar name. What sane person would name a town after an occupation, particularly one that a normal person wouldn't exactly be proud to be a part of?

This is a sick town. No one knows why, but the mesothelioma rates here are absurdly high. I mean, really, really high. It's hard to know exactly how many people suffer from this awful cancer because of the high latency period, but according to some of the latest estimates, as much as 70% of the population is afflicted with it.

We can't explain it. Usually when you have a lot of mesothelioma cases within a small geographic area, the cause is obvious. Most likely, it's because a bunch of construction workers are forced to work with asbestos. They breathe the fibers in, their lungs can't expel them because they're too big, and before they know it, the wheels are set in motion.

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