Review: A Kind And Savage Place by Richard Helms

The new book by author Richard Helms, A Kind And Savage Place is a prequel to Six Mile Creek and others that are part of the Judd Wheeler series. While Judd plays a role in this book that runs from 1942 to 1989, he is not the central character.

Instead, this is a book about how daily interactions, even minor ones, have a major impact. Each contact has a reverberation to it for all involved. Then there are the reverberations of childhood and the random role of dice regarding who are parents are as we enter the world. That childhood, and the families we come from and their legacy, for good or ill, reverberates throughout our lives. Even death, at a young age or after a full life have a reverberation through others on and on. People talk about the fall of a single domino and how that changes everything. They miss all the dominoes that lead up to that single domino being in a certain place at a certain time and thus there to fall.  

That idea, all the dominoes that must fall to cause the certain domino to fall in a major way—seen by some and unseen by many others—is the heart of this complex tale that spans generations, families, and decades. While a central act plays a major role and triggers all sorts of events across decades, many minor daily interactions played a role for that event to happen. Life is complex as author Rick Helms beautifully illustrates in A Kind and Savage Place as he illustrates through a number of characters in this complex tale.

One of those daily interactions that was unremarkable at the time and yet put many things into motion was when Arlo Pyle hired Everett Howard to work in his auto shop. Pyle, a while man who had been to Europe and fought the Nazis before coming back home, hired Everett Howard to work in his shop and run errands. Howard was black, a young kid, and had dropped out of the segregated school, which wasn’t much to begin with, as was common at the time in North Carolina and elsewhere. It didn’t help Howard’s educational prospects that he was also a bit slow. He soon proved to Pyle that he was a hard worker.

Despite doing everything he knew to do and doing a job well, that did not stop others from accusing him of misdeeds. The fact that Howard had not done any of things he was accused of never mattered to those who could not see beyond the color of his skin.

An inability to see others as they truly are also played a major role in life as Rennie Poole was able to parlay a humble start as a local businessman, into a political force. Some folks saw him for what he was at the start and avoided him. Many others did not and became part of his world to manipulate. Long before his political career and the creation of his political machine, one of his projects was a local dancehall where teens hung out.

It was there, on a warm Saturday night in May 1954, Coral Pyle, one of four daughters of Arlo Pyle, and Adele Pyle, met Jude Pressley. A recent graduate and QB of ­considerable talent at the local level, Pressley is currently drifting through life and enjoying the adoration as a county football champion who set more than a dozen records. He also has good looks and has certainly caught the attention of Coral Pyle. That meeting in the dance hall put into motion a series of events that changed their lives forever while also directly and indirectly impacting nearly every character in this wide ranging and complicated book.

Set against the social movements of the various decades with themes of politics, greed, racism, and more, author Rick Helms tells a complicated and engrossing tale. Far more is at work beyond the brief premise. To explain more would create spoilers as things and people are tightly interlocked in this wide ranging and complex read.

Life, death, drama, and a lot more, are at work in A Kind and Savage Place by Rick Helms.

Strongly recommended. 

 

My reading copy was an ARC provided by the author with no expectation of a review.

 

Kevin R. Tipple ©2022