A Book A Week

As the hardships of The Great Depression emerged, the people of the hills of North Carolina buckled down to make ends meet. For many families, this meant grueling days of chipping away at the trees of those hills to produce the sap that helped drive the turpentine industry. It is among these hills that we are introduced to young Rae Lynn Cobb. Rae Lynn has always been a bit aloof, but she's settled into life with her husband Warren. He's a bit older than the kind of man she imagined she would end up with, but he cares for her nonetheless. 

The couple has made a go at their own turpentine endeavor, a life that is as difficult as it is dangerous. It is after years of labor that an act of negligence sees Warren gravely injured. In those final hours, he begs for mercy, and Rae Lynn obliges. There's only one problem, she has no way to prove that ending her husband's life was an act of mercy and not something more nefarious. Desperate to avoid jail, she chops off her hair, disguises herself as a man named Ray, and sets out to work in a turpentine camp in Georgia. 

Delwood Reese has set out to escape some problems of his own. Swallow Hill, a turpentine camp in Georgia, is just about as far away from those troubles as he can get. His experience in the field nets him a job there. The conditions are harsh, and the lodging is meager, but Del is at peace with the place. He encounters a slight young man named Ray, who is far from adequate at meeting his daily quotas. There is something about the man that Del is drawn to, and he soon becomes his protector, shielding Ray from the worst consequences of his inadequate work. As Del earns the trust of the camp's owner, he begins to envision changes to make life in Swallow Hill better.

I'm rarely drawn to historical fiction as a genre, but when I do read it, I want to be transported to the time and place that it depicts. In The Saints of Swallow Hill, Donna Everhart plants her readers amongst the grit and dust of laboring in the turpentine fields. She inhabits this history with characters who are richly drawn in a way that connects the reader to them and the era they live in. Amongst commentary on gender roles, relationships, and racism, Everhart crafts a narrative that speaks to the power of finding your own voice, standing for what you believe in, and learning to trust yourself and others. Once I was firmly planted in the world that Everhart created, I didn't want to leave. Simply put The Saints of Swallow Hill is historical fiction at its best. 

For more information visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2022, 38)