Sceptre paperback 1988
256 pages

From the Back Cover:

A Lesson Before Dying is set in a small Cajun community in the late 1940s. Jefferson, a young black man, is an unwitting party to a liquor store shootout in which three men are killed; the only survivor, he is convicted of murder and sentenced to death. Grant Wiggings, who left his hometown for university, has returned to the plantation school to teach. As he struggles with his decision whether to stay or escape to another state, his aunt and Jefferson's godmother persuade him to visit Jefferson in his cell and impart his learning and his pride to Jefferson before his death. In the end, the two men forge a bond as they both come to understand the simple heroism of resisting - and defying - the expected.

Ernest J. Gaines brings to this novel the same rich sense of place, the same deep understanding of the human psyche, and the same compassion for a people and their struggle that have informed his previous, highly praised works of fiction.

wishlist RABCK
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Going to the next person while changing books in Kamppi ;)

A real surprise book delivery! Thank you so much, hippolein!

At times books just want to be read in a certain moment, and that's what this one did, by falling off a pile. It certainly isn't an uplifting read, not a comforting read, but irritating, inconsolable, almost daunting at the very end. The book is filled with themes and topics to every line, alphabet and space, and it rubs your nose on every single one of them. If the Jim Crow era isn't too familiar to you, do pick up this book.

Perhaps as a side note: I hate people like Grant's aunt, hate them to the bone. A community can not survive if it only expects its offsprings to "save" them or bring any kind of redemption to them from generation to generation. It speaks more about the community's roots than its vitality and importance to the society.

Book's waiting at the feet of Wäinö Aaltonen's Muse!

This is a Statue Release for summer 2020.

Nokittu, lukuun