46 pages • 1 hour read
The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row
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Chapters 10-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 10 Summary: “The Death Squad”
Hinton begins the chapter with a startling revelation: One of his fellow death row inmates, Wayne Ritter, has been executed. He realizes it the morning after. While he heard some noises in the night, it was not until morning—and the repellant odors—that he understands what happened. The attending guard laughs at Hinton's response.
Hinton recounts the exploits of the “Execution team” (a self-moniker), but adds: “[E]veryone knew what they really were—the Death Squad” (99). This squad regularly practiced their routine until the time came for the next execution.
The next to be executed is Michael Lindsay. In this instance, Hinton and the other death row inmates do what they can to rebel. They make as much noise as they can, and scream “until the lights stopped flickering and the generator that powered the electric chair turned off” (101). Hinton mentions that Lindsay had had no visitors before his execution, and had spoken no last words. The inmates clamor in the hope that Lindsay would hear their voices.
The executions become regular enough for Hinton to try to assess them as part of his own routine. He receives a letter, from Perhacs. This letter, Hinton reveals, “could be the answer I had been waiting on from the Alabama Supreme Court” (102). He waits to open the letter, even smiles at the guard who delivered it. Upon reading the letter, however, Hinton is once again discouraged: Perhacs all but gave up on the case. Hinton would need a new lawyer.
After reporting about more executions, and a visit from his best friend Lester, Hinton gives up. He tells Lester that his execution is inevitable, and his wish is that Lester will lie to Hinton's mother so she won’t know what is bound to happen. He even wants Lester to reassure his mother that her faith in God has been justified.
Near the end of the chapter, Hinton once again hears the name Bryan Stevenson. Stevenson both stood by to comfort another executed inmate, and sent a member of his legal team—Santha Sonenberg, a “solitary white woman”—to represent Hinton (108).
Chapter 11 Summary: “Waiting to Die”
Hinton states the U.S. Supreme Court denied his petition. He reports the execution of another inmate, and wonders when he will hear back from Sonenberg. He also begins to equate McGregor with an actual murderer: “He had called me Mr. Sneak. Mr. Robber. Mr. Executioner […] He was the guilty one. He was the murderer” (111).
Hinton says he is suffering from anxiety and dementia. He begins to doubt his own thoughts, and finds himself counting the steps from his cell door to the toilet: “I counted them out in my head and then turned around and counted them again as I walked to the back of my cell” (113). At this point, Hinton becomes an unwittingly unreliable narrator. He even doubts news that he recently received about his best friend’s impending wedding and a dinner party his mother planned.
Eventually, Hinton has news that the mother of a fellow inmate has died. Hinton offers sympathy, and eventually returns to the Bible that he has previously tucked away, and quotes from it. “It was,” Hinton recounts, “a revelation to realize that I was not the only man on death row” (117).
He closes the chapter with a seemingly astounding event: One of the prisoners has laughed. It was not a cackle, not the resigned laughter of the damned, but an actual, joyful laugh. Hinton comments, “[W]ith that laughter, I realized that the state of Alabama […] couldn’t steal my soul or my humanity […] And they most certainly couldn’t steal my sense of humor” (118). From here in on, Hinton reports, he will do more to befriend his fellow inmates, and make use of his time to comfort others with support and laughter.
Chapter 12 Summary: “The Queen of England”
His faith renewed, Hinton prays for a new lawyer, and reflects on the potential ironies of the outcome of prayer, akin to making a poorly-considered wish: “I knew a guy in the county jail who used to pray everyday to get to leave C block […] He did leave C block, but only to go into solitary confinement” (120). Recounting this anecdote, Hinton reports that he says his prayers carefully.
He has been in touch with Santha Sonenberg and devotes his library time to reading about Alabama law. He comes across a term—judicial override—wherein a judge can overturn a jury’s giving a life sentence, and, instead, insist on the death penalty. In discussing this legal concept with his fellow inmates, he learns that many of them were victims of judicial override.
He becomes closer with more of his fellow prisoners and befriends some who will give only their first names: Henry, Jesse, and Wallace. Hinton returns to his Bible before Wallace is executed on July 13, 1990.
At this point Hinton dives into another imaginary episode; in this case, he is flying to England to be hosted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace. His fantasy continues in detail, only to be interrupted when he is told he has visitors. Confused about the day, he greets his mother and Lester, as well as Lester’s mother, and wife. Lester asks him where he’s been; Hinton, still shaking off his imagined stay in London, replies: “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you” (127). He realizes there is a third way to escape death row: with imagination.
Chapters 10-12 Analysis
In this section, Hinton employs description, dramatic pacing, and confirms what he hopes is his status as a reliable narrator and ethical human being. His reaction to the first execution, in Chapter 10, where he uses olfactory sense to describe the smell of death, can be compared to the imagined details of his visit with the Queen of England. The morning after the execution, Hinton writes that the deathly smell “was a mixture of shit and rotting waste and vomit all mixed up in a thick smoke of putrid air” (98). This description stands in stark contrast to his imagined trip to England. In his fantasy, the plane held a bed “with a velvet comforter […] when I climbed into the sheets, the smelled like freshly mowed lawns and magnolia blossoms” (125).
Hinton's pacing also allows the reader to sense the same tension he endured during his imprisonment. The executions become more regular; Hinton is worried his date will soon be set. He writes: “It seemed like they were planning on executing one man per month now” (102). Immediately after this comment, a guard shouts Hinton’s own prison number—468—startling him out of his ruminations. Was he next? He was not; in fact, he received some mail. He becomes ecstatic once more: “This [letter] could be the answer I had been waiting on […] My freedom! I could feel the hope rise up in me” (102). Unfortunately, though, it is simply more bad news from his lawyer: They would need much more money to continue with Hinton's appeal. This sense for dramatic timing and revelation is further explored in Chapter 12, which begins with a quotation from Assistant Attorney Kenneth S. Nunnelley, who is preparing to set Hinton’s execution date. Shortly thereafter, he gets promising news from Santha Sonenberg.
Additionally, Hinton establishes himself as a believable narrator and person who shows—and therefore has earned—compassion. In Chapter 10, he begs Lester never to inform his mother if and when his execution is scheduled and finally carried out; Hinton simply cannot bear to see his mother suffer on his behalf. Lester, in tears, asks Hinton if there isn’t someone else to carry out his wish. Hinton details the scene: “Lester’s face had a pain in it I had never seen before, and my heart broke that I was the cause” (106). In Chapter 11, as Hinton is starting to feel sorry for himself, he lists a series of complaints over which he has been mulling. Hearing one of his fellow inmates weeping shifts his focus from self to other, and he seeks to comfort the crying man, who reports that his mother just passed away.
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