The Keepers of the House

In this continuously absorbing narrative of the lives of Negroes and whites, intermingling violence and tenderness, love and vengeance, Shirley Ann Grau has written one of the most compelling novels about the South today.

Going back two generations of Howlands — a middle-class family with a blood-stained history as early settlers in Gulf Coast territory — Miss grau sows the seeds of her story when Will Howland, a widower, meets a young Negro who becomes his housekeeper and mistress and bears him children. Years later, Abigail, his only white granddaughter, who has grown up in this mixed-blood family, marries a segregationist politicians, and the Howland past is exposed.

The brutal response of the bigoted white community and Abigail's devastating reprisal procide a chilling climax to this beautifully written novel that reveals such a wide knowledge of human nature, both Negor and white.