Lane von Herzen: Fair Warning

My Third Novel's Conclusion, My Heartbreak

My heart begins to break when I think about completing this particular book -- because this narrative has sustained me like no other story I've known. It's both more personal and more universal than my other works. But beyond memory and archetype, it's a cri-de-coeur about needing to become the person one is destined to be. And in the writing, I have met my own life's work, my own fated journey -- having the sense all the while that the pages are suffused with a resonance, an energy, an electrified field that defies explanation. Writers hope and pray to be overtaken by a work in this way -- to be conscripted into passionate service of a profound story. To experience it even once in a lifetime seems a great privilege. I still have several months before this novel is complete, and this constitutes my reprieve. Because I'm not ready for the beauty to end.

Saturday, December 27, 2025

Fair Warning

My father, who was an infinitely wise man, exercised extraordinary restraint in situations that would have driven most people to exasperation.

His patience was superhuman.

The fuse on his temper was as long as an undersea communications cable, spanning the continental shelf.

But one never wanted to exhaust it.

Occasionally, very occasionally, he would utter the words "Fair warning."

This was a gift to whoever had crossed his boundaries.

He only said it once. One time. If you didn't hear him, God help you.

I myself only rarely utter these words.

But I am speaking them now.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, has failed to register as a foreign agent while traveling in a foreign country -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, carried or transferred a package with unknown contents at the directive of his handlers while within the United States or while traveling in a foreign country -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, were forced by their handlers to engage in human trafficking activities or drug trafficking activities within the United States or while traveling within a foreign country -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, engaged in a Pxxxxxx Program assignment of any kind while within the United States or within a foreign country -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, engaged in communications that implicated him or her of wrongdoing of any kind while within the United States or within a foreign country -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

If a member of my family, whether related to me by blood or by marriage, provided knowingly false witness statements at the directive of his or her handlers or others -- after I informed the DOJ that this matter needed to be corrected -- such a lapse would make the Executive Branch look extremely culpable of malfeasance.

To the FBI and its affiliated agencies: Hands off my family. Hands off my children. Hands off my friends. Hands off my pets. Hands off myself.

To the good people involved in this case, and I know that some of them are advocating for us within the Executive Branch, I am endeavoring to make myself eminently clear.

The future freedoms of Americans cannot and will not be held hostage to the further harm of those I love by the foreign adversaries of the United States.

Fair warning to those who would -- whether now or in the future -- seek to entrap, ensnare, corner, coerce, compel, corrupt, extort, harm, defame or defile my family.

The truth is a persistent task master. And no one is exempt from the truth's full illumination, nor from the dispassionate stare of history in evaluating the full course of events.

Now is the time to remember the import of these words and their pressing requirement that decision-making demonstrate greater wisdom, greater understanding, and finer judgment.