Mikal Gilmore (born February 9, 1951) is an American writer and music journalist.

Early life and writing career

Gilmore was born to Frank and Bessie Gilmore, and was also known for being the younger brother of convicted criminal Gary Gilmore. In the 1970s Gilmore began writing music articles and criticism for ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' magazine. In 1999, his ''Night Beat: A Shadow History of Rock and Roll'' was published by

Anchor An anchor is a device, normally made of metal, used to secure a vessel to the bed of a body of water to prevent the craft from drifting due to wind or current. The word derives from Latin ', which itself comes from the Greek (). Anch ...

. In July 2009, he released ''Stories Done: Writings on the 1960s and its Discontents''. It was published by Free Press.

Memoir

His brother, Gary, (December 4, 1940 – January 17, 1977) was an American criminal who gained international attention for demanding the implementation of his

death sentence Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...

for two murders he committed in

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

. After the

U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...

upheld a new series of death penalty statutes in the 1976 decision ''

Gregg v. Georgia ''Gregg v. Georgia'', ''Proffitt v. Florida'', ''Jurek v. Texas'', ''Woodson v. North Carolina'', and ''Roberts v. Louisiana'', 428 U.S. 153 (1976), is a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court. It reaffirmed the Court's acceptance of the ...

'', he became the first person in almost ten years to be executed in the United States. In 1994, Mikal published a memoir titled '' Shot in the Heart'', detailing his relationship with Gary and their often troubled family, starting with the original

Mormon Mormons are a religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, the principal branch of the Latter Day Saint movement started by Joseph Smith in upstate New York during the 1820s. After Smith's death in 1844, the movement split into several ...

settlers and continuing through to Gary's execution and its aftermath. ''Shot in the Heart'' received positive reviews, including a comment by ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' critic

Michiko Kakutani is an American writer and retired literary critic, best known for reviewing books for ''The New York Times'' from 1983 to 2017. In that role, she won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1998. Early life and family Kakutani, a Japanese Americ ...

calling the book "Remarkable, astonishing... ''Shot in the Heart'' reads like a combination of Brothers Karamazov and a series of Johnny Cash ballads... chilling, heartbreaking, and alarming." That year, ''Shot in the Heart'' won the

Los Angeles Times Book Prize Since 1980, the ''Los Angeles Times'' has awarded a set of annual book prizes. The ''Los Angeles Times'' Book Prize currently has nine categories: biography, current interest, fiction, first fiction (the Art Seidenbaum Award added in 1991), his ...

and the

National Book Critics Circle Award The National Book Critics Circle Awards are a set of annual American literary awards by the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) to promote "the finest books and reviews published in English".HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

film starring Giovanni Ribisi as Mikal,

Elias Koteas Elias Koteas (; ; born March 11, 1961) is a Canadian actor who has performed in lead and supporting roles in numerous films and television series. He won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film '' Ararat'' (20 ...

as Gary,

Sam Shepard Samuel Shepard Rogers III (November 5, 1943 – July 27, 2017) was an American playwright, actor, director, screenwriter, and author whose career spanned half a century. He wrote 58 plays as well as several books of short stories, essays, ...

as the brothers' father and

Lee Tergesen Lee Allen Tergesen (; born July 8, 1965) is an American actor. He is known for his portrayals of Chett Donnelly on USA Network's '' Weird Science'' (1994–1998), Tobias Beecher on HBO's '' Oz'' (1997–2003), Peter McMillan on the second seas ...

as Frank Gilmore, Jr. The 1977

punk rock Punk rock (also known as simply punk) is a rock music genre that emerged in the mid-1970s. Rooted in 1950s rock and roll and 1960s garage rock, punk bands rejected the corporate nature of mainstream 1970s rock music. They typically produced sh ...

single " Gary Gilmore's Eyes" by the band

The Adverts The Adverts were an English punk rock band formed in 1976 that existed until late 1979. They were one of the first punk bands to achieve mainstream success in the UK; their 1977 Single (music), single "Gary Gilmore's Eyes" reached No. 18 on the ...

was used in the soundtrack of the movie. The song is written from "the point of view of a hospital patient who has received the eyes of Gary Gilmore in a transplant."

References

External links

* 1951 births Living people American music journalists American memoirists Rolling Stone people Journalists from Portland, Oregon American biographers American male biographers National Book Critics Circle Award winners {{US-journalist-1950s-stub