This week we are delighted to have folks from the library’s Circulation Services division join us. This first post of the week comes from Alan Bernstein.
Between 1983 and 2002 Michael Malone wrote three novels (Uncivil Seasons, Time’s Witness, and First Lady) about the fictional North Carolina town of Hillston.
Hillston is an exemplar of the new South, where old patterns, customs, and habits of life and the newer forces of economic, cultural, social, and demographic change must and do find ways to coexist and accommodate in order to keep the community prosperous and viable. The two central characters in each novel are the Hillston blue-blood and
family black-sheep Detective (later Lieutenant) Justin Savile V and his working class friend, partner, and superior Police Chief Cuddy Mangum.
On one level each book can be considered a crime novel or thriller, because a crime is committed, which is then solved by the two policemen. However, writing crime novels is not the author’s primary intent. Rather, Michael Malone’s real interest is the interplay of human emotions and competing forces in Hillston, as the novels’ characters deal with the world they inhabit.
There are countless works of fiction that attempt to cast light on the real world. But what really sets these novels apart and makes them so outstanding are 1) the author’s talent to create good plot lines and stories and the ability to tell them well while employing a sparkling and masterful prose style, 2) his skill in populating his stories with real, identifiable, and sympathetic human beings, not cardboard cut-outs, and 3) his deliberate intent to make parts of the stories almost uproariously funny, especially in the verbal interchanges between the 2 protagonists.
I recommend all three books to anyone who relishes intelligent, literate, and arresting stories well told and well written. They are as suitable for the beach as for an easy chair by a crackling fire. Even though each book is an independent stand-alone, I recommend that each should be read in the order listed, because there is some character development and references to past cases from book to book.
I would like to end by stating that I own all three books, which, to me, is the highest form of recommendation.
Check the WRL catalog for Uncivil Seasons
Check the WRL catalog for Time’s Witness
Check the WRL catalog for First Lady
Blogging for a Good Book 
a bit late but nevertheless, rc’d uncivil seasons for my birthday, am in the middle of time’s witness, and can’t wait to get my hands on first lady (who narrates that one i wonder). any thoughts about his other writing?
Hi, Amy, thanks for your comment. If you enjoy Malone’s crime novels, I think that you will find something to please you in his other works as well. In particular, I would recommend Foolscap, Handling Sin, and his latest, The Four Corners of the Sky. We have reviewed them all here at BFGB. Happy reading!
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