Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The boundaries of racial and sexual propriety are crossed with a vengeance in Terrell's powerful, evocative debut novel, which tells the story of a young black ex-con named Booker Short who calls in a favor after getting out of prison and turns an entire town upside down in the process. When Short finishes doing time for his nebulous role in a dope-selling operation, Mercury Chapman, the white man who was his grandfather's commander in the service, sets Short up with a caretaker job in Kansas City. The young man's rise through the ranks of Kansas City society accelerates considerably when he begins a tumultuous affair with troubled, erratic Clarissa Sayers, a white judge's daughter whom he meets on the job. Their edgy union unnerves everyone they know, especially Clarissa's father, Thornton. But as most of the town knows, Thornton is on uncertain ground himself, his relationship with his daughter disturbingly close. When Clarissa turns up murdered, Short becomes the most likely suspect, but he goes underground until a final meeting between Chapman, Short and Sayers reveals the volatile wartime source of Chapman's old debt and exposes the explosive scandal in an ending that is both surprising and disturbing. Shopworn themes of race and redemption are overhauled here, familiar but fresh in their present-day setting. Terrell's somewhat formal, stilted prose style slows the story's momentum in the early going, but he does a fine job of capturing the atmosphere of Kansas City while fleshing out an intriguing array of characters. Despite the rough edges, the depth of Terrell's emotional and moral perspective marks him as a serious writer with major potential. Regional author tour. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Stan Granger, loner and fisherman, pulls the body of a young white woman from the Missouri River. It's not his first encounter with a waterlogged corpse, but this time it's someone he knows. She was Clarissa Sayers, the strange and wild daughter of a federal judge, and her death was caused not by drowning but by a blow to the head. Suspicion centers on Booker Short, a young black parole violator from Oklahoma with whom she'd been having an affair. Though in part the history of a homicide, this first novel offers a hard look at themes old and new. Short, the huntsman, hunts not only the real killer but more importantly his own identity, rooted in the old sins of old men, both black and white. This is a powerful, well-written debut, resonant of Ellison, Faulkner, and Twain for its portrayal of America's underbelly, by an author who is a native of Kansas City and currently writer-in-residence at Rockhurst University. Highly recommended for all public libraries.Jack Hafer, Chesterfield Cty. P.L., VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The murder of a young Kansas City socialite serves as the starting point for a contemporary tale of incest, hypocrisy, and race relations. When a young white woman's body is snagged by a fishing line in the Missouri River, near Kansas City, it's quickly discovered that her death was no accident, and the police begin to search for the most obvious suspect-her African-American boyfriend, Booker Short. The manhunt, however, covers only a portion of the story as Terrell, investigating the boundaries where history, memory, and legend converge, sets the scene with long forays into Short's youth: the night his father ran away, literally a step ahead of the law; the day soon after when his mother brought young Booker to her parents and then left him behind; and his coming of age on his grandfather's farm. Also recalled are the wartime experiences and unpleasant secrets of Short's erstwhile patron, septuagenarian Mercury Chapman, a white man who had commanded black troops, including Short's bitter grandfather, during WWII, and who was involved in the military execution of one of his men, the final revelation of which turns Booker's preconceived notions upside down. There are also the horrific personal and family secrets of the dead woman, Clarissa Sayers, daughter of a prominent judge. Terrell leaves few stones unturned in his effort to mine these family histories, and scrape away the ambiguities-he even explores the Sayers family background, going back two generations. While the story remains somewhat a mystery-is Booker Short the murderer?-the answer is subsumed by the whole complexity of the narrative. That complexity includes comic interludes-an intern reporter who thinks his prose ought to be literary rather than journalistic; the man who recovers the body has an immediate crush on the detective investigating the crime-that are so finely woven in that there's no change of pace. The author simply never loses his voice. A masterful, surprising first novel, Faulknerian in its tone and structure, by a fine new storyteller.
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