Ernest J Gaines

Set on a Louisiana sugar cane plantation in the 1970s, the book is a powerful depiction of racial tensions arising over the death of a Cajun farmer at the hands of a black man.

In his first novel in ten years, Ernest Gaines, the highly acclaimed author of the best-selling The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, brings us a wrenching story of death and identity in a small Cajun Louisiana community in the late 1940s. A young black named Jefferson is a reluctant party in a shoot-out in a liquor store in which the three other men involved are all killed, including the white store owner. Jefferson, the only survivor, is accused...

A gathering of old men: A regular day in a Louisiana sugarcane plantation changes course when a local white farmer, a racist, is shot. A group of old, black men takes a courageous step by coming forward en masse to take responsibility for the killing. As the sheriff confronts the suspects, the young plantation owner stands alone in her defense of this group of men who stand resolute against decades of injustice. In his father's shoes: After his father's...

A frustrated teacher in a southern town, whose education is being underutilized, finds his own purpose in helping bring meaning to the last days of a young man due to be executed. In teaching one person to die with dignity, he redeems himself.