ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, May 5, 1996 TAG: 9605060004
SECTION: BOOKS PAGE: 4 EDITION: METRO
MY SOUL TO KEEP
By Judith Hawkes. Dutton. $23.95.
This novel is a supernatural thriller/mystery set in the Tennessee mountains. New York fashion photographer Nan Lucas spends the summer at the country home she inherited from her grandmother and encounters peculiarities from the start. The book's leisurely beginning soon becomes a suspenseful page-turner, building to a satisfying climax
Though Hawkes portrays ghosts in a believable manner, she is less successful with her treatment of mountain people. The stereotypical image of dirt-poor hillbillies pervades., as in this scene where Nan arrives at a big family party: " ... the Talbot barnyard looked like a used-car lot, full of shabby station wagons and pickup trucks with their noses aimed haphazardly in the direction of the fence."
- TONI WILLIAMS
MILLIONAIRE'S ROW.
By Norman Katkov. Dutton. $23.85.
During the Depression and in the land of the North Carolina tobacco kings, a scion is found with a bullet in his head. With that established, Norman Katkov trots out a whole closet of stereotypes from Hollywood where he spent a career as a scriptwriter. The result is as musky and unpalatable as an overripe Carolina pumpkin.
This seems to be a novel written with a movie sale in mind. It has an evil white sheriff and noble, down-trodden black folks and enough discrepancies in culture, language and actual behavior to make those who know better just laugh and forget it.
- ROBERT HILLDRUP
Toni Williams writes from her home near Natural Bridge.
Robert Hilldrup is a Richmond writer and former newspaperman.
LENGTH: Short : 42 linesby CNB